Tings are collapsing in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that appears, in this volume especially, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Establishments are failing, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from states, and gathering in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of conglomerates, the control of crowds. "An element is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were stable and strong are deteriorating and failing."
Key Puzzle 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 continues where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final foray into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting universe he first revealed 30 years ago, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of the real world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals look and think and act like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, essences in creature form; where the air are filled with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, vehicles are ridden and drinks is drunk, and middle-aged scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in the first volume, the prequel with which Pullman began the series, is now a adult: still distinctly the sharp and tenacious heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, sadder, more careful, more doubtful. This restraint is amplified by her division from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to leave in search of that childlike part of her which she may have forgotten (an trait which he represents as her "creativity"), and her mission to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw the protagonist undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in play, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the church's ruling body, and the author's brilliantly sinister embodiment of austere, administrative wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – Lyra's relative, who faults her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of president of the Magisterium's governing body, and is determined on using his recently acquired power to broaden the religion's dominium. Another protagonist, who rescued infant the heroine to safety along a overflowing river as an child in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is sent to Geneva to learn more about the antagonist's aims. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and precious rose oil which seems mysteriously to be the origin of a social and economic disturbance spreading out from the region. The oil is seen by various factions as a commercial good, by alternate groups as a empirical or mystical miracle, and by yet others – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a origin of darkness; an challenge that must be obliterated. The question of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be removed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
As in His Dark Materials, our protagonist's decisions, and her fate, are revealed to be deeply linked with the destiny of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these storylines ran broadly in parallel. In the conclusion, they converge. Like the original series, the protagonist's movements and her path are revealed to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the world. Her private mission to rejoin with her soul and recover her imagination becomes the primary battleground in a larger war with an authoritarian system which, as these systems always have, is seeking to stifle autonomy of thought, creativity and culture: all the inner, defiant ways in which humans can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles
The story starts with the finding of a collection of unusual fissures in the fabric of the planet's sky: windows that seem to lead to alternate realities. An example of a opening manifests to be the origin of the much debated mystical extract. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its helm, classifies these openings as a problem to the religion's orthodoxy and sets out to eliminate them. As the heroine begins to move from strict logic and revert to intuition, however, her belief that these sites must be protected – that their significance and what they offer is mysteriously crucial – grows. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a philosophical struggle between innocence and maturity is prepared.
Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
