Tings are collapsing in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that seems, now more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from authorities, and gathering in the chambers of religious leaders, the treasuries of business empires, the grasp of mobs. "An element is at work, very quietly, gradually", says merchant a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his place in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and strong are deteriorating and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the question that propels the concluding book, which picks up where the previous book concluded. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding excursion into the carefully crafted, deeply captivating universe he first revealed in the distant past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose landscape aligns with that of our world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals look and reason and act like us, but are joined by external spirits, beings in creature form; where the heavens are filled with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but below, transports are caught and beverages is sipped, and mature scholars carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the prequel, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still clearly the prickly and persistent main character of the prior volumes, but more mature, sadder, more careful, less certain. This restraint is intensified by her division from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to leave in search of that innocent part of her which she seems to have lost (an trait which he represents as her "creativity"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed Lyra undertake a wandering voyage across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with amazement and danger on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the church's controlling power, and Pullman's masterfully eerie incarnation of austere, bureaucratic wickedness – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's relative, who blames her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the position of leader of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his newfound influence to extend the institution's rule. Another protagonist, who carried infant Lyra to refuge along a flooded Thames as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is dispatched to Geneva to learn more about Delamare's intentions. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and costly essential oil which appears somehow to be the source of a social and economic crisis spreading out from Central Asia. The extract is regarded by some as a tradeable commodity, by others as a scientific or esoteric miracle, and by others still – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of darkness; an insult that must be destroyed. The question of its origins, its meaning, and whether it should be destroyed or preserved is coming rapidly to the fore.
Similar to His Dark Materials, our protagonist's decisions, and her future, are revealed to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the universe
In its predecessor, these storylines ran largely in parallel. In The Rose Field, they merge. Like the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her fate are revealed to be inextricably woven with the destiny of the universe. Her individual quest to reunite with her soul and regain her imagination becomes the central struggle in a broader battle with an oppressive government which, as such regimes typically do, is seeking to stifle autonomy of thought, innovation and expression: all the internal, rebellious ways in which humans can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The novel begins with the unveiling of a series of unusual openings in the structure of the planet's air: portals that seem to open into other worlds. One such opening seems to be the source of the much debated rose oil. The authority, with Delamare at its leadership, designates these portals as a challenge to the religion's beliefs and endeavors to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to shift from inflexible logic and back to instinct, yet, her conviction that these places must be protected – that their significance and what they offer is in some way vital – strengthens. "The substance, or the substance, or the vision, or the field of roses, or no matter what we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a philosophical conflict between innocence and maturity is set.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
