Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a universe that manifests, in this volume especially, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reassembling themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from authorities, and pooling in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the control of mobs. "An element is at work, silently, gradually", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were stable and strong are weakening and failing."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Just what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that drives the concluding book, which continues where the previous book concluded. This is, according to many, the author's final venture into the elaborately built, deeply captivating realm he first introduced 30 years ago, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose geography aligns with that of our world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the people appear and reason and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, beings in beast form; where the heavens are teeming with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, buses are taken and tea is consumed, and middle-aged scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the first volume, the prequel with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still distinctly the prickly and persistent protagonist of the prior volumes, but older, more sorrowful, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is heightened by her split from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to go off in search of that youthful part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an quality which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which followed the protagonist undertake a wandering journey across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with amazement and danger on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in play, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the church's ruling body, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister embodiment of rigid, bureaucratic wickedness – is under new leadership, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's relative, who blames her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of president of the authority's governing body, and is determined on using his newfound influence to expand the institution's rule. Another protagonist, who carried baby Lyra to safety along a swollen Thames as an young boy in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in spycraft: he is sent to the city to learn more about Delamare's aims. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and costly rose oil which appears somehow to be the source of a societal and financial disturbance rippling out from Central Asia. The oil is seen by certain groups as a tradeable good, by others as a research-based or esoteric phenomenon, and by others still – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a source of darkness; an affront that must be eradicated. The issue of where it comes from, its meaning, and if it should be destroyed or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
Similar to the original trilogy, our protagonist's deeds, and her destiny, are shown to be inseparably connected with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these narratives ran largely in tandem. In the conclusion, they come together. Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's choices and her destiny are shown to be inextricably entwined with the future of the universe. Her individual quest to reunite with her daemon and rediscover her creativity becomes the central struggle in a broader battle with an authoritarian government which, as such authorities always have, is attempting to stifle independence of reason, innovation and expression: all the internal, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The story begins with the unveiling of a collection of strange cracks in the structure of the Earth's atmosphere: gateways that appear to lead to alternate realities. An example of a portal seems to be the source of the much debated mystical extract. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its leadership, classifies these portals as a challenge to the church's doctrine and aims to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from strict reason and return to feeling, however, her conviction that these places must be defended – that their significance and their value is mysteriously essential – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or the extract, or the imagination, or the Rose Field, or whatever we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a Blakean struggle between naivety and maturity is established.
Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
