Tings are unraveling in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a world that seems, in this volume especially, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along new and troubling lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is draining from authorities, and pooling in the halls of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the control of mobs. "Some force is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and solid are faltering and giving way."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that animates The Rose Field, which resumes where the previous book concluded. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's concluding venture into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting realm he first introduced 30 years ago, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose terrain aligns with that of our world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the people appear and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by daemons, souls in beast form; where the air are teeming with witches and gryphons, but beneath those skies, transports are ridden and tea is consumed, and older academics carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the first volume, the prequel with which the author began this trilogy, is now a adult: still distinctly the prickly and tenacious heroine of the prior volumes, but aged, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This restraint is intensified by her split from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to depart in pursuit of that innocent part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a wandering trek across Europe and into the mountain region, encountering with wonder and risk on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in action, and sinister powers at work. The church authority – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of austere, procedural evil – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. The antagonist – the heroine's family member, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of head of the church's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his fresh authority to extend the institution's dominium. A key character, who saved baby Lyra to safety along a swollen river as an child in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a sideline in intelligence work: he is assigned to Geneva to learn more about Delamare's plans. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and costly rose oil which appears in some way to be the origin of a societal and economic crisis rippling out from Central Asia. The substance is seen by various factions as a tradeable commodity, by others as a scientific or mystical wonder, and by yet others – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a origin of darkness; an challenge that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its source, its significance, and whether it should be eliminated or preserved is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, Lyra's deeds, and her fate, are demonstrated to be inextricably linked with the fate of the universe
In the previous volume, these narratives ran largely in parallel. In The Rose Field, they converge. Similar to His Dark Materials, the protagonist's actions and her fate are unveiled to be deeply linked with the destiny of the world. Her individual journey to rejoin with her companion and recover her imagination becomes the central battleground in a broader conflict with an authoritarian system which, as these systems always have, is attempting to quell autonomy of thought, innovation and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which individuals can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles
The novel begins with the unveiling of a collection of unusual cracks in the fabric of the Earth's sky: portals that look to open into other worlds. An example of a portal seems to be the point of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with the antagonist at its leadership, classifies these openings as a problem to the religion's beliefs and sets out to destroy them. As Lyra begins to turn away from inflexible reason and revert to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be defended – that their significance and their value is mysteriously crucial – strengthens. "Dust, or rose oil, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a Blakean struggle between innocence and maturity is set.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the