Tings are collapsing in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a universe that manifests, now more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Organizations are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along new and troubling lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from governments, and accumulating in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "An element is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and durable are deteriorating and collapsing."
Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that propels this final volume, which picks up where the previous book concluded. This is, according to many, Pullman's last excursion into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling world he first introduced in the distant past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose geography maps on to that of the real world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the humans look and reason and act like us, but are joined by animal souls, essences in animal form; where the air are teeming with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, vehicles are caught and tea is drunk, and mature professors carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still distinctly the prickly and tenacious main character of the previous installments, but older, more sorrowful, warier, more doubtful. This circumscription is amplified by her split from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to go off in quest of that innocent part of her which she may have forgotten (an quality which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a adventurous voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in action, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the faith's governing authority, and the author's deliciously chilling embodiment of strict, bureaucratic wickedness – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's family member, who blames her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the role of president of the authority's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his recently acquired influence to extend the religion's rule. Another protagonist, who rescued young the heroine to security along a flooded Thames as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a additional duty in spycraft: he is dispatched to Geneva to learn more about the antagonist's aims. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and precious essential oil which manifests in some way to be the origin of a social and economic disturbance spreading out from Central Asia. The extract is regarded by various factions as a marketable good, by alternate groups as a empirical or mystical wonder, and by yet others – the zealous "highland figures" – as a origin of darkness; an affront that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its source, its meaning, and if it should be removed or protected is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, the heroine's decisions, and her fate, are revealed to be deeply connected with the destiny of the world
In the previous volume, these storylines ran broadly in tandem. In this final book, they merge. Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's movements and her path are shown to be deeply woven with the destiny of the realm. Her personal journey to reunite with her soul and recover her creativity becomes the key conflict in a larger war with an oppressive government which, as these systems typically do, is attempting to suppress freedom of thought, innovation and culture: all the personal, rebellious ways in which people can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The story begins with the unveiling of a set of curious cracks in the fabric of the world's air: windows that look to lead to other worlds. An example of a opening appears to be the point of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The authority, with Delamare at its helm, labels these windows as a threat to the church's doctrine and sets out to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to shift from inflexible logic and revert to intuition, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be protected – that what they stand for and their value is mysteriously vital – increases. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a philosophical tussle between innocence and experience is set.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
