Things are collapsing in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that seems, in this volume especially, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Organizations are failing, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from governments, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the treasuries of conglomerates, the grasp of crowds. "An element is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his post in an city cafe. "Things we thought were stable and durable are faltering and failing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the question that propels the concluding book, which continues where the previous book ended. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding venture into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting realm he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the people appear and reason and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, essences in creature form; where the air are teeming with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are caught and tea is consumed, and mature scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in the first volume, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the sharp and determined main character of the earlier books, but more mature, more sorrowful, more careful, more doubtful. This restraint is intensified by her separation from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to depart in pursuit of that youthful part of her which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her mission to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, encountering with amazement and peril on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The religious council – the religious governing authority, and the author's brilliantly sinister incarnation of strict, administrative wickedness – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the office of leader of the authority's ruling assembly, and is set on using his newfound power to extend the institution's control. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued baby the heroine to security along a swollen river as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a sideline in intelligence work: he is dispatched to the city to discover more about his aims. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and valuable botanical extract which appears somehow to be the source of a societal and economic crisis rippling out from Central Asia. The substance is viewed by some as a marketable good, by others as a research-based or esoteric wonder, and by further factions – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of malevolence; an challenge that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its origins, its meaning, and if it should be removed or protected is escalating in importance.
Similar to the original trilogy, our protagonist's actions, and her future, are shown to be inseparably connected with the destiny of the universe
In the previous volume, these plots ran mostly in parallel. In this final book, they come together. Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions and her destiny are revealed to be inseparably woven with the future of the universe. Her personal mission to reunite with her soul and rediscover her creativity becomes the central struggle in a broader conflict with an controlling regime which, as such authorities often attempt, is attempting to quell independence of thinking, innovation and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The book opens with the discovery of a series of unusual cracks in the structure of the planet's atmosphere: portals that look to give on to alternate realities. A particular window seems to be the origin of the highly contested rose oil. The church, with its leader at its leadership, designates these windows as a problem to the institution's beliefs and aims to destroy them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict logic and return to intuition, nevertheless, her conviction that these places must be defended – that their meaning and their value is in some way crucial – grows. "Dust, or the extract, or the vision, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a Blakean conflict between purity and knowledge is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
