Things are collapsing in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's masterful trilogies set in a universe that seems, now more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or restructuring themselves along new and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from states, and gathering in the offices of religious leaders, the coffers of conglomerates, the hands of rioters. "Something is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and durable are weakening and giving way."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that animates this final volume, which continues where its predecessor left off. This is, by all accounts, the author's last venture into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating world he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose terrain maps on to that of this world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the people appear and reason and act like us, but are paired by external spirits, souls in creature form; where the air are populated with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but underneath, transports are ridden and tea is sipped, and older professors carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a child in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a adult: still distinctly the spiky and determined main character of the earlier books, but aged, melancholic, warier, less sure. This circumscription is intensified by her split from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to depart in search of that innocent part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an quality which he represents as her "vision"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which followed Lyra undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, encountering with wonder and danger on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the religious ruling body, and the author's deliciously chilling representation of austere, procedural evil – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's family member, who faults her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the role of head of the church's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his recently acquired authority to broaden the church's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who carried baby Lyra to security along a swollen Thames as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in espionage: he is assigned to Geneva to learn more about Delamare's aims. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and costly rose oil which manifests mysteriously to be the origin of a social and financial disturbance spreading out from Central Asia. The oil is seen by some as a commercial good, by alternate groups as a research-based or esoteric phenomenon, and by further factions – the zealous "highland figures" – as a source of evil; an challenge that must be destroyed. The dilemma of where it comes from, its meaning, and if it should be destroyed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
As in the original trilogy, our protagonist's actions, and her future, are revealed to be deeply connected with the fate of the universe
In the previous volume, these narratives ran mostly in tandem. In the conclusion, they converge. Like His Dark Materials, her choices and her path are revealed to be inseparably linked with the fate of the universe. Her private quest to reunite with her companion and regain her creativity becomes the central struggle in a wider conflict with an authoritarian government which, as such authorities always have, is seeking to suppress freedom of thinking, originality and expression: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The novel starts with the discovery of a set of unusual openings in the fabric of the world's sky: gateways that look to open into different dimensions. One such window seems to be the source of the much debated rose oil. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these windows as a challenge to the religion's doctrine and sets out to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to move from inflexible reason and revert to instinct, yet, her belief that these locations must be defended – that what they stand for and what they provide is mysteriously crucial – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or whatever we name it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a poetic tussle between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
