Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a universe that manifests, now more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along new and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from governments, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the treasuries of conglomerates, the control of rioters. "An element is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were stable and strong are faltering and giving way."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that propels the concluding book, which resumes where its predecessor concluded. This is, according to many, the author's final excursion into the carefully crafted, deeply captivating world he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose terrain aligns with that of our world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the people look and reason and act like us, but are paired by animal souls, beings in animal form; where the air are filled with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but below, vehicles are taken and tea is consumed, and older professors carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began the series, is now a adult: still distinctly the prickly and determined main character of the earlier books, but aged, melancholic, warier, less sure. This circumscription is heightened by her separation from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to go off in pursuit of that innocent part of her which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "vision"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw the protagonist undertake a picaresque trek across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with amazement and peril on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the religious governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie incarnation of austere, bureaucratic evil – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the office of president of the authority's governing body, and is intent on using his fresh influence to broaden the church's control. Malcolm Polstead, who carried baby Lyra to security along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is dispatched to Geneva to find out more about Delamare's plans. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and precious rose oil which manifests in some way to be the cause of a societal and financial upheaval emanating out from the region. The oil is regarded by certain groups as a marketable good, by different parties as a research-based or esoteric wonder, and by further factions – the extremist "highland figures" – as a wellspring of darkness; an challenge that must be obliterated. The issue of its origins, its meaning, and if it should be removed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, the heroine's decisions, and her destiny, are shown to be inextricably entwined with the future of the universe
In the previous volume, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In this final book, they come together. As in the first trilogy, her actions and her destiny are shown to be inseparably linked with the fate of the realm. Her personal quest to rejoin with her companion and regain her creativity becomes the primary battleground in a larger battle with an authoritarian government which, as these systems always have, is attempting to quell freedom of thought, originality and art: all the personal, rebellious ways in which individuals can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The novel starts with the unveiling of a set of curious fissures in the makeup of the Earth's atmosphere: gateways that appear to open into other worlds. One such portal seems to be the point of the highly contested mystical extract. The church, with the antagonist at its leadership, classifies these portals as a threat to the institution's beliefs and endeavors to destroy them. As Lyra begins to turn away from inflexible logic and revert to instinct, nevertheless, her certainty that these places must be defended – that their significance and what they provide is in some way crucial – grows. "Dust, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a poetic struggle between purity and experience is set.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
