Things are collapsing in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the next of the author's masterful trilogies set in a realm that manifests, in this volume especially, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reorganizing themselves along new and troubling lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is draining from states, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "Something is at work, silently, gradually", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and strong are faltering and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Just what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that animates the concluding book, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, reportedly, the author's final excursion into the carefully crafted, deeply captivating world he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose terrain aligns with that of the real world, but whose past diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans appear and think and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, beings in beast form; where the heavens are teeming with sorceresses and gryphons, but below, vehicles are caught and drinks is drunk, and older professors carry Harrods shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still distinctly the prickly and tenacious heroine of the earlier books, but older, sadder, more careful, less sure. This restraint is amplified by her separation from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
The daemon's resolve to leave in pursuit of that innocent part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and risk on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in action, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of strict, procedural wickedness – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's relative, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of leader of the authority's High Council, and is determined on using his recently acquired influence to extend the church's rule. A key character, who saved young Lyra to safety along a swollen river as an young boy in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in spycraft: he is dispatched to the city to find out more about his plans. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and costly essential oil which seems in some way to be the source of a societal and economic upheaval rippling out from the region. The substance is seen by various factions as a tradeable product, by different parties as a scientific or esoteric wonder, and by others still – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of darkness; an challenge that must be destroyed. The question of where it comes from, what it stands for, and whether it should be eliminated or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
Similar to the first series, our protagonist's actions, and her fate, are shown to be inseparably connected with the fate of the world
In the previous volume, these plots ran largely in tandem. In this final book, they merge. Similar to His Dark Materials, the protagonist's choices and her fate are shown to be deeply linked with the fate of the world. Her personal quest to reconnect with her soul and regain her imagination becomes the primary conflict in a larger conflict with an controlling system which, as these systems always have, is attempting to suppress freedom of thought, creativity and culture: all the inner, defiant ways in which individuals can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The novel begins with the unveiling of a series of curious openings in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: windows that seem to open into different dimensions. An example of a window appears to be the point of the highly contested mystical extract. The Magisterium, with its leader at its helm, classifies these openings as a threat to the religion's orthodoxy and sets out to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to move from inflexible logic and return to feeling, nevertheless, her certainty that these sites must be preserved – that their significance and what they provide is mysteriously vital – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or the extract, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a Blakean conflict between purity and maturity is established.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
