Tings are collapsing in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a realm that manifests, now more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reassembling themselves along new and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from authorities, and gathering in the halls of religious leaders, the coffers of business empires, the grasp of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his place in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were stable and strong are faltering and collapsing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Exactly what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that animates this final volume, which continues where its predecessor concluded. This is, according to many, the author's last foray into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting universe he first revealed 30 years ago, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography aligns with that of our world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals appear and reason and act like us, but are joined by external spirits, souls in beast form; where the skies are filled with enchantresses and gryphons, but beneath those skies, vehicles are ridden and tea is drunk, and middle-aged professors carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still distinctly the sharp and tenacious heroine of the earlier books, but older, more sorrowful, warier, more doubtful. This circumscription is amplified by her division from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
The daemon's resolve to depart in quest of that youthful part of her which she appears to have shed (an trait which he symbolizes as her "imagination"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a wandering voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with amazement and danger on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in motion, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the faith's governing authority, and the author's brilliantly sinister embodiment of strict, administrative malice – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of head of the Magisterium's High Council, and is set on using his fresh authority to extend the church's rule. Another protagonist, who rescued infant Lyra to safety along a overflowing river as an child in the first book, is now an academic with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is dispatched to the city to learn more about the antagonist's aims. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and costly botanical extract which seems mysteriously to be the origin of a social and financial crisis emanating out from Central Asia. The oil is seen by some as a tradeable product, by different parties as a empirical or spiritual wonder, and by others still – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a source of darkness; an insult that must be destroyed. The question of its origins, its significance, and if it should be destroyed or preserved is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in His Dark Materials, the heroine's deeds, and her destiny, are shown to be inextricably linked with the future of the universe
In the previous volume, these plots ran mostly in parallel. In the conclusion, they merge. As in the first trilogy, Lyra's actions and her path are unveiled to be inextricably woven with the future of the realm. Her personal journey to reconnect with her companion and rediscover her imagination becomes the key struggle in a wider war with an oppressive regime which, as such authorities often attempt, is seeking to stifle autonomy of reason, creativity and art: all the internal, resistant ways in which individuals can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The book opens with the finding of a set of curious openings in the makeup of the world's air: portals that seem to give on to other worlds. An example of a portal manifests to be the origin of the much debated mystical extract. The authority, with its leader at its leadership, designates these windows as a threat to the institution's doctrine and aims to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to move from inflexible rationalism and return to feeling, nevertheless, her conviction that these places must be protected – that their significance and what they offer is somehow crucial – increases. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a Blakean struggle between naivety and experience is set.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
