Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that appears, now more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reorganizing themselves along new and troubling lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from states, and accumulating in the offices of religious leaders, the coffers of corporations, the hands of crowds. "Some force is at work, stealthily, gradually", says merchant a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and durable are deteriorating and failing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Exactly what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that propels the concluding book, which continues where its predecessor ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's final foray into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating universe he first unveiled in the distant past, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the people appear and think and act like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, souls in creature form; where the heavens are teeming with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, transports are caught and beverages is sipped, and middle-aged academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the prequel, the prequel with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still clearly the spiky and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, sadder, more cautious, less certain. This restraint is intensified by her separation from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to depart in search of that innocent part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw 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, underlying forces were in action, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the church's governing authority, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of rigid, procedural evil – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who blames her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the role of leader of the authority's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his fresh authority to expand the religion's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued young the heroine to security along a swollen Thames as an child in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in spycraft: he is assigned to a key location to discover more about his aims. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the scarce and precious rose oil which manifests mysteriously to be the origin of a societal and financial disturbance emanating out from that area. The extract is viewed by some as a marketable good, by different parties as a research-based or spiritual phenomenon, and by yet others – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a source of darkness; an affront that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its source, what it stands for, and whether it should be removed or preserved is escalating in importance.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's deeds, and her future, are shown to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these narratives ran broadly in tandem. In this final book, they converge. Similar to the first trilogy, her movements and her path are shown to be inextricably entwined with the destiny of the world. Her personal quest to reconnect with her daemon and rediscover her creativity becomes the primary conflict in a wider conflict with an oppressive regime which, as these systems typically do, is striving to suppress autonomy of reason, originality and culture: all the personal, defiant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The book starts with the discovery of a set of strange openings in the makeup of the Earth's atmosphere: gateways that seem to give on to alternate realities. An example of a opening appears to be the source of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The church, with Delamare at its head, designates these openings as a threat to the institution's doctrine and endeavors to destroy them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict logic and back to intuition, nevertheless, her conviction that these locations must be defended – that their significance and what they provide is mysteriously crucial – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a poetic struggle between purity and knowledge is established.
Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
