Tings are unraveling in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a world that seems, here more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reassembling themselves along novel and troubling lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from states, and pooling in the halls of religious leaders, the coffers of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "Something is at work, very quietly, gradually", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and solid are faltering and collapsing."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Precisely what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that drives The Rose Field, which resumes where its predecessor ended. This is, reportedly, the author's final foray into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting universe he first revealed three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of the real world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals appear and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, essences in beast form; where the heavens are populated with enchantresses and gryphons, but below, buses are ridden and tea is drunk, and older academics carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a young girl in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the prequel, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a mature individual: still clearly the prickly and determined heroine of the previous installments, but more mature, sadder, more careful, less sure. This circumscription is amplified by her separation from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of her which she may have forgotten (an quality which he represents as her "vision"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across Europe and into the mountain region, encountering with wonder and risk on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in motion, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the church's governing authority, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of rigid, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and asserting its power. The antagonist – Lyra's family member, who faults her for his sister's death – has positioned himself into the role of head of the authority's High Council, and is set on using his newfound influence to extend the religion's dominium. A key character, who carried young the heroine to safety along a swollen river as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is sent to a key location to learn more about Delamare's aims. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly essential oil which manifests mysteriously to be the origin of a social and economic disturbance spreading out from the region. The substance is regarded by some as a tradeable good, by alternate groups as a empirical or esoteric phenomenon, and by others still – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a origin of malevolence; an insult that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or protected is escalating in importance.
Similar to His Dark Materials, the heroine's decisions, and her destiny, are revealed to be inseparably connected with the future of the universe
In its predecessor, these narratives ran largely in parallel. In this final book, they come together. Like the first trilogy, Lyra's movements and her fate are revealed to be deeply linked with the destiny of the world. Her individual quest to reunite with her companion and rediscover her creativity becomes the key conflict in a wider battle with an authoritarian government which, as these systems always have, is attempting to quell autonomy of thought, originality and art: all the personal, rebellious ways in which people can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The story opens with the discovery of a set of unusual fissures in the fabric of the planet's air: windows that look to open into different dimensions. A particular portal seems to be the origin of the highly contested mystical extract. The authority, with the antagonist at its leadership, classifies these portals as a threat to the institution's doctrine and sets out to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to move from strict rationalism and return to intuition, yet, her certainty that these locations must be defended – that what they stand for and what they offer is somehow essential – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a poetic tussle between naivety and knowledge is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
