Things are collapsing in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a universe that seems, here more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reorganizing themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is shifting from governments, and accumulating in the offices of religious leaders, the treasuries of corporations, the control of rioters. "An element is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and durable are deteriorating and failing."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that propels the concluding book, which resumes where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, by all accounts, the author's last excursion into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling world he first introduced three decades past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose terrain aligns with that of this world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals appear and think and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, beings in beast form; where the heavens are filled with witches and gryphons, but underneath, transports are taken and drinks is consumed, and mature scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a child in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still recognisably the spiky and persistent protagonist of the prior volumes, but older, more sorrowful, more careful, more doubtful. This restraint is intensified by her split from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to go off in search of that innocent part of her which she seems to have lost (an trait which he represents as her "imagination"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which saw Lyra undertake a adventurous voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in action, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the religious ruling body, and the author's deliciously chilling representation of rigid, procedural evil – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who faults her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the position of president of the authority's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his recently acquired authority to expand the church's rule. A key character, who rescued baby Lyra to refuge along a flooded river as an young boy in the first book, is now an academic with a sideline in spycraft: he is sent to the city to discover more about Delamare's intentions. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and costly rose oil which manifests mysteriously to be the cause of a social and financial disturbance emanating out from the region. The oil is seen by various factions as a tradeable product, by others as a empirical or spiritual miracle, and by yet others – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a source of malevolence; an insult that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
Similar to the original trilogy, Lyra's deeds, and her future, are revealed to be deeply linked with the fate of the world
In its predecessor, these narratives ran broadly in tandem. In this final book, they merge. Similar to the original series, Lyra's choices and her destiny are shown to be inextricably woven with the destiny of the universe. Her private quest to reconnect with her companion and recover her imagination becomes the central conflict in a larger battle with an oppressive system which, as such regimes typically do, is striving to quell autonomy of thought, originality and culture: all the personal, defiant ways in which humans can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The novel opens with the finding of a set of unusual cracks in the fabric of the planet's sky: portals that look to open into different dimensions. One such portal seems to be the source of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The church, with the antagonist at its helm, designates these windows as a problem to the institution's beliefs and aims to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from rigid rationalism and return to feeling, however, her certainty that these locations must be protected – that their significance and what they provide is in some way crucial – strengthens. "Dust, or the extract, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a Blakean struggle between naivety and maturity is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the