Things are falling apart in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, now more than ever, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reassembling themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is draining from authorities, and accumulating in the chambers of theocrats, the vaults of business empires, the control of mobs. "Something is at work, silently, gradually", says businessman a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and durable are deteriorating and giving way."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Just what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that drives the concluding book, which continues where its predecessor ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's final venture into the elaborately built, deeply captivating universe he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a world whose geography corresponds to that of our world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans look and think and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, souls in animal form; where the skies are teeming with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but underneath, buses are ridden and beverages is consumed, and older scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the first volume, the prequel with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still clearly the sharp and persistent main character of the prior volumes, but aged, more sorrowful, warier, more doubtful. This limitation is heightened by her separation from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to depart in quest of that youthful part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her mission to rejoin with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque trek across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the religious controlling power, and Pullman's deliciously chilling embodiment of strict, bureaucratic malice – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the role of president of the church's governing body, and is determined on using his recently acquired authority to expand the religion's control. Malcolm Polstead, who carried baby the heroine to security along a swollen Thames as an child in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in espionage: he is dispatched to Geneva to discover more about his plans. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and costly rose oil which manifests somehow to be the cause of a societal and economic disturbance rippling out from Central Asia. The oil is regarded by certain groups as a commercial product, by alternate groups as a research-based or esoteric wonder, and by others still – the extremist "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of evil; an affront that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its origins, its significance, and if it should be removed or preserved is escalating in importance.
Similar to the original trilogy, our protagonist's actions, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be inseparably entwined with the future of the world
In the previous volume, these storylines ran broadly in tandem. In the conclusion, they converge. As in the original series, the protagonist's movements and her fate are unveiled to be deeply linked with the destiny of the universe. Her private quest to reunite with her soul and recover her vision becomes the key struggle in a broader conflict with an authoritarian government which, as such regimes often attempt, is attempting to suppress freedom of thought, innovation and culture: all the personal, resistant ways in which people can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The novel opens with the unveiling of a set of strange openings in the fabric of the Earth's atmosphere: windows that appear to open into different dimensions. A particular window manifests to be the origin of the much debated botanical substance. The authority, with Delamare at its leadership, classifies these portals as a threat to the institution's orthodoxy and endeavors to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to shift from strict logic and return to intuition, however, her certainty that these locations must be protected – that what they stand for and what they provide is in some way vital – strengthens. "The substance, or the substance, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a Blakean conflict between innocence and maturity is set.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
