Things are collapsing in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the next of the author's masterful trilogies set in a world that seems, here more than ever, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reassembling themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from authorities, and gathering in the offices of religious leaders, the vaults of conglomerates, the control of crowds. "Something is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and durable are weakening and failing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Exactly what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that propels The Rose Field, which resumes where its predecessor left off. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding excursion into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling universe he first unveiled in the distant past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose landscape corresponds to that of this world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the individuals appear and reason and behave like us, but are paired by daemons, souls in animal form; where the skies are populated with witches and legendary creatures, but underneath, transports are caught and drinks is consumed, and older professors carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still clearly the spiky and tenacious main character of the prior volumes, but more mature, melancholic, more cautious, less sure. This limitation is intensified by her split from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to leave in search of that innocent part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an quality which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which chronicled Lyra undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with marvel and peril on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in play, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the religious ruling body, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of strict, bureaucratic evil – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. The antagonist – our protagonist's family member, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the role of president of the authority's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his newfound power to expand the church's control. Another protagonist, who carried infant Lyra to refuge along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in espionage: he is sent to a key location to learn more about his intentions. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the scarce and precious essential oil which seems somehow to be the origin of a societal and economic upheaval spreading out from Central Asia. The substance is seen by some as a commercial commodity, by others as a scientific or spiritual miracle, and by others still – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a origin of malevolence; an insult that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its source, its meaning, and whether it should be removed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Similar to the original trilogy, the heroine's decisions, and her future, are revealed to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the universe
In The Secret Commonwealth, these storylines ran broadly in tandem. In the conclusion, they converge. Like the original series, Lyra's actions and her fate are unveiled to be inextricably linked with the future of the realm. Her private mission to reconnect with her companion and rediscover her imagination becomes the primary conflict in a wider conflict with an controlling system which, as these systems typically do, is striving to stifle autonomy of reason, innovation and art: all the personal, defiant ways in which individuals can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The story opens with the finding of a set of unusual openings in the fabric of the planet's atmosphere: portals that appear to give on to alternate realities. An example of a portal seems to be the point of the much debated botanical substance. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its head, designates these portals as a challenge to the church's beliefs and aims to destroy them. As the heroine begins to shift from inflexible rationalism and return to feeling, however, her conviction that these sites must be preserved – that their meaning and their value is somehow crucial – strengthens. "The substance, or the extract, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or whatever we name it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a Blakean conflict between naivety and experience is established.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the