Things are falling apart in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that appears, in this volume especially, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Organizations are crumbling, or reassembling themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from authorities, and pooling in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the grasp of rioters. "Some force is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were stable and durable are weakening and failing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Just what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that animates the concluding book, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's last foray into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting world he first revealed 30 years ago, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose terrain corresponds to that of our world, but whose past diverges and shifts with ours; where the people look and reason and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, souls in creature form; where the skies are populated with witches and legendary creatures, but underneath, vehicles are taken and beverages is sipped, and mature professors carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the sharp and tenacious main character of the prior volumes, but older, melancholic, more cautious, less sure. This restraint is amplified by her division from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the cause which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to go off in pursuit of that youthful part of her which she seems to have lost (an trait which he represents as her "imagination"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which saw the protagonist undertake a picaresque journey across the continent and into the Caucasus, encountering with marvel and peril on the way. But from the start, deeper currents were in action, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the church's controlling power, and Pullman's deliciously chilling representation of austere, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – Lyra's family member, who faults her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the role of president of the authority's High Council, and is determined on using his fresh authority to broaden the church's control. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued young the heroine to safety along a overflowing river as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a additional duty in espionage: he is dispatched to a key location to find out more about Delamare's intentions. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and valuable essential oil which appears in some way to be the source of a social and financial disturbance spreading out from the region. The extract is regarded by various factions as a commercial product, by different parties as a research-based or mystical wonder, and by others still – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of darkness; an affront that must be destroyed. The issue of its source, its significance, and whether it should be removed or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like the original trilogy, the heroine's actions, and her destiny, are shown to be inseparably entwined with the destiny of the realm
In its predecessor, these storylines ran broadly in parallel. In the conclusion, they come together. Like the original series, her movements and her destiny are revealed to be inseparably woven with the fate of the world. Her individual journey to reunite with her companion and rediscover her vision becomes the central struggle in a larger war with an oppressive system which, as such authorities always have, is striving to quell freedom of thought, innovation and culture: all the internal, rebellious ways in which people can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The story begins with the unveiling of a series of unusual cracks in the structure of the world's sky: gateways that look to open into other worlds. One such opening appears to be the origin of the highly contested botanical substance. The Magisterium, with its leader at its leadership, classifies these openings as a challenge to the church's doctrine and endeavors to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from inflexible reason and revert to instinct, however, her belief that these locations must be defended – that their meaning and their value is somehow crucial – increases. "The substance, or the extract, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a Blakean tussle between naivety and maturity is prepared.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
