Things are unraveling in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's masterful trilogies set in a realm that seems, in this volume especially, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reassembling themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An invisible force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from governments, and gathering in the chambers of religious leaders, the vaults of corporations, the hands of crowds. "An element is at work, stealthily, gradually", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his place in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and strong are deteriorating and failing."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Exactly what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that propels this final volume, which resumes where its predecessor concluded. This is, reportedly, the author's final foray into the intricately constructed, endlessly enchanting world he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose geography maps on to that of the real world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the people look and think and act like us, but are paired by external spirits, essences in creature form; where the skies are filled with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, buses are ridden and drinks is consumed, and middle-aged academics carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a adult: still clearly the sharp and determined protagonist of the earlier books, but more mature, melancholic, more careful, more doubtful. This restraint is intensified by her split from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to depart in search of that childlike part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an quality which he represents as her "vision"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw the protagonist undertake a picaresque journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and peril on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The religious council – the church's ruling body, and the author's brilliantly sinister embodiment of strict, bureaucratic wickedness – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. The antagonist – Lyra's family member, who faults her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the role of president of the Magisterium's High Council, and is intent on using his newfound influence to broaden the church's dominium. Another protagonist, who saved young Lyra to safety along a flooded river as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is sent to the city to find out more about his intentions. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and valuable essential oil which seems somehow to be the cause of a societal and financial crisis emanating out from Central Asia. The substance is regarded by certain groups as a commercial good, by alternate groups as a research-based or spiritual phenomenon, and by further factions – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of darkness; an insult that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in the first series, Lyra's decisions, and her destiny, are shown to be inextricably entwined with the future of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran largely in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. As in the original series, Lyra's choices and her path are unveiled to be inextricably entwined with the future of the realm. Her private journey to reunite with her soul and rediscover her imagination becomes the key battleground in a wider war with an controlling regime which, as such regimes always have, is attempting to quell freedom of thought, creativity and culture: all the internal, defiant ways in which people can be free.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The novel starts with the unveiling of a collection of unusual fissures in the makeup of the world's atmosphere: portals that appear to lead to other worlds. One such opening manifests to be the point of the highly contested mystical extract. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its leadership, designates these windows as a problem to the religion's beliefs and endeavors to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to shift from strict reason and return to feeling, however, her conviction that these locations must be defended – that their significance and what they provide is somehow vital – increases. "The substance, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or whatever we label it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a poetic struggle between innocence and maturity is set.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
