Things are collapsing in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that appears, now more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reassembling themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from authorities, and gathering in the chambers of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the grasp of mobs. "Some force is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his place in an city cafe. "Things we thought were stable and solid are faltering and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Precisely what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that propels this final volume, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth concluded. This is, reportedly, the author's final excursion into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling universe he first introduced 30 years ago, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose terrain aligns with that of the real world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the humans appear and reason and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, essences in creature form; where the air are teeming with witches and gryphons, but below, transports are ridden and tea is drunk, and middle-aged scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still clearly the prickly and tenacious heroine of the earlier books, but aged, sadder, warier, less certain. This circumscription is intensified by her separation from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
The daemon's resolve to depart in search of that childlike part of her which she seems to have lost (an trait which he epitomises as her "vision"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed the protagonist undertake a wandering voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the church's ruling body, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister embodiment of rigid, administrative wickedness – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – our protagonist's family member, who blames her for his sister's death – has positioned himself into the role of head of the Magisterium's governing body, and is set on using his newfound authority to expand the institution's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who carried baby the heroine to refuge along a overflowing Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in espionage: he is sent to Geneva to learn more about Delamare's plans. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly botanical extract which seems in some way to be the cause of a social and economic crisis spreading out from Central Asia. The substance is regarded by certain groups as a tradeable product, by alternate groups as a scientific or spiritual wonder, and by further factions – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a source of malevolence; an challenge that must be eradicated. The issue of where it comes from, its meaning, and if it should be eliminated or protected is becoming urgent.
Like the original trilogy, the heroine's deeds, and her fate, are shown to be inextricably connected with the fate of the realm
In The Secret Commonwealth, these narratives ran largely in tandem. In this final book, they come together. Similar to His Dark Materials, her choices and her fate are shown to be deeply entwined with the fate of the realm. Her personal quest to reunite with her daemon and recover her creativity becomes the key struggle in a larger war with an controlling regime which, as these systems typically do, is seeking to suppress freedom of thought, innovation and culture: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The story starts with the discovery of a set of curious openings in the fabric of the planet's sky: portals that appear to give on to alternate realities. One such window seems to be the point of the highly contested botanical substance. The Magisterium, with its leader at its head, classifies these portals as a challenge to the church's beliefs and endeavors to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to shift from rigid logic and revert to instinct, however, her certainty that these sites must be protected – that their significance and what they provide is in some way vital – increases. "Dust, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a Blakean tussle between innocence and knowledge is set.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
