Tings are unraveling in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a world that appears, here more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from governments, and accumulating in the chambers of theocrats, the treasuries of conglomerates, the control of crowds. "Some force is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and strong are deteriorating and collapsing."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Precisely what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that propels this final volume, which resumes where its predecessor concluded. This is, by all accounts, the author's concluding venture into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting world he first introduced three decades past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose terrain aligns with that of our world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals appear and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by daemons, souls in animal form; where the heavens are teeming with witches and legendary creatures, but underneath, transports are ridden and drinks is sipped, and older professors carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a child in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still distinctly the sharp and tenacious main character of the earlier books, but aged, sadder, warier, more doubtful. This circumscription is amplified by her separation from her animal guide, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to leave in search of that childlike part of her which she appears to have shed (an trait which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a picaresque trek across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with wonder and peril on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the faith's governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling embodiment of strict, procedural evil – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of head of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is set on using his recently acquired power to extend the religion's rule. Another protagonist, who saved young the heroine to refuge along a swollen river as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is dispatched to Geneva to discover more about the antagonist's plans. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the rare and costly botanical extract which manifests mysteriously to be the cause of a social and financial upheaval rippling out from the region. The extract is regarded by certain groups as a commercial product, by others as a research-based or mystical wonder, and by further factions – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of darkness; an affront that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its source, its significance, and whether it should be removed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Similar to the original trilogy, Lyra's deeds, and her destiny, are revealed to be inextricably connected with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In this final book, they come together. Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's movements and her path are unveiled to be inseparably linked with the fate of the world. Her individual quest to rejoin with her companion and regain her imagination becomes the key battleground in a larger battle with an controlling government which, as such authorities always have, is seeking to stifle autonomy of thinking, creativity and culture: all the inner, rebellious ways in which people can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The book begins with the unveiling of a set of curious fissures in the fabric of the world's air: portals that look to give on to different dimensions. A particular window seems to be the origin of the highly contested rose oil. The church, with Delamare at its head, classifies these portals as a problem to the institution's doctrine and sets out to eliminate them. As the heroine begins to shift from strict reason and return to instinct, however, her belief that these places must be defended – that their significance and what they offer is somehow vital – grows. "Dust, or the extract, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a philosophical tussle between innocence and experience is set.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
