Things are collapsing in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that appears, in this volume especially, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along novel and troubling lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from authorities, and gathering in the halls of religious leaders, the vaults of business empires, the hands of rioters. "Some force is at work, silently, gradually", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and durable are faltering and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Just what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the question that animates The Rose Field, which picks up where the previous book concluded. This is, reportedly, Pullman's concluding venture into the elaborately built, deeply captivating world he first introduced three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose landscape aligns with that of this world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans look and think and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, souls in beast form; where the air are filled with witches and mythical beasts, but below, vehicles are ridden and drinks is consumed, and mature academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still recognisably the sharp and tenacious heroine of the earlier books, but more mature, melancholic, more cautious, less sure. This restraint is intensified by her division from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of her which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with amazement and danger on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the religious ruling body, and the author's masterfully eerie representation of rigid, bureaucratic wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's relative, who blames her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the role of president of the authority's governing body, and is determined on using his recently acquired influence to expand the religion's control. Malcolm Polstead, who saved baby Lyra to safety along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is dispatched to a key location to learn more about the antagonist's aims. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and valuable rose oil which appears in some way to be the source of a social and economic disturbance rippling out from that area. The substance is regarded by some as a marketable product, by different parties as a empirical or spiritual wonder, and by others still – the extremist "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of darkness; an challenge that must be destroyed. The question of its origins, its meaning, and if it should be destroyed or preserved is escalating in importance.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's actions, and her destiny, are revealed to be deeply entwined with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. Like the first trilogy, Lyra's choices and her path are unveiled to be inseparably woven with the destiny of the world. Her private quest to reunite with her soul and regain her creativity becomes the central conflict in a larger conflict with an authoritarian system which, as these systems typically do, is striving to stifle freedom of thought, innovation and expression: all the personal, rebellious ways in which people can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The story begins with the finding of a series of strange fissures in the makeup of the world's sky: windows that appear to give on to alternate realities. One such opening appears to be the source of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The church, with its leader at its head, designates these windows as a challenge to the church's doctrine and endeavors to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from inflexible logic and revert to intuition, however, her belief that these locations must be protected – that their meaning and their value is somehow vital – increases. "Dust, or rose oil, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a philosophical struggle between innocence and maturity is prepared.
Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
