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Tings are unraveling in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a universe that appears, in this volume especially, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or reassembling themselves along new and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from states, and pooling in the chambers of religious leaders, the coffers of conglomerates, the hands of crowds. "Some force is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and durable are deteriorating and collapsing."

Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path

Just what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that propels the concluding book, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, according to many, the author's last venture into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling world he first revealed three decades past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of our world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the people look and reason and act like us, but are joined by animal souls, souls in beast form; where the air are teeming with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but below, buses are taken and tea is sipped, and older professors carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still clearly the spiky and tenacious main character of the earlier books, but older, sadder, more cautious, less sure. This restraint is intensified by her division from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.

Converging Storylines

Pan's decision to leave in quest of that innocent part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an trait which he represents as her "imagination"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw the protagonist undertake a picaresque trek across the continent and into the mountain region, encountering with marvel and danger on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the faith's governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of austere, bureaucratic evil – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's uncle, who blames her for his sister's death – has positioned himself into the position of leader of the Magisterium's High Council, and is determined on using his recently acquired power to broaden the church's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who saved infant the heroine to refuge along a flooded Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in espionage: he is dispatched to a key location to find out more about the antagonist's plans. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and costly essential oil which appears somehow to be the cause of a social and economic disturbance rippling out from Central Asia. The oil is seen by various factions as a tradeable product, by others as a research-based or esoteric miracle, and by others still – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an affront that must be obliterated. The issue of its origins, its meaning, and if it should be removed or preserved is becoming urgent.

As in His Dark Materials, the heroine's decisions, and her fate, are demonstrated to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the realm

In its predecessor, these narratives ran largely in parallel. In The Rose Field, they merge. Like the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her destiny are unveiled to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the world. Her individual journey to reunite with her companion and rediscover her imagination becomes the primary struggle in a larger war with an oppressive government which, as such authorities always have, is seeking to quell autonomy of thought, creativity and expression: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be liberated.

Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles

The book opens with the unveiling of a collection of strange openings in the structure of the Earth's sky: portals that seem to open into other worlds. A particular opening manifests to be the point of the highly contested rose oil. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its head, classifies these openings as a problem to the religion's beliefs and endeavors to eliminate them. As the heroine begins to turn away from rigid reason and back to instinct, yet, her certainty that these locations must be preserved – that their meaning and their value is mysteriously essential – strengthens. "Dust, or the extract, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a poetic struggle between innocence and maturity is set.

Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth

At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the