Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a universe that appears, in this volume especially, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Establishments are failing, or restructuring themselves along new and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from governments, and accumulating in the offices of theocrats, the coffers of conglomerates, the hands of rioters. "Some force is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says trader a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and durable are deteriorating and giving way."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the mystery that propels the concluding book, which resumes where its predecessor ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's final foray into the elaborately built, deeply captivating world he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a world whose geography corresponds to that of our world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals look and think and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, essences in beast form; where the heavens are teeming with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are ridden and tea is sipped, and middle-aged professors carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a child in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a adult: still clearly the sharp and tenacious heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, more sorrowful, more careful, more doubtful. This restraint is intensified by her separation from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to leave in quest of that innocent part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an quality which he epitomises as her "vision"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed the protagonist undertake a adventurous trek across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with wonder and risk on the way. But from the outset, deeper currents were in action, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of strict, bureaucratic wickedness – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. The antagonist – the heroine's family member, who faults her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the role of leader of the authority's High Council, and is determined on using his recently acquired power to extend the church's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued baby Lyra to security along a overflowing river as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in espionage: he is dispatched to Geneva to learn more about Delamare's plans. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and precious botanical extract which seems in some way to be the cause of a societal and economic disturbance spreading out from the region. The extract is regarded by certain groups as a marketable product, by alternate groups as a scientific or spiritual miracle, and by others still – the zealous "highland figures" – as a wellspring of darkness; an challenge that must be obliterated. The issue of where it comes from, its significance, and if it should be removed or protected is escalating in importance.
Like the original trilogy, the heroine's deeds, and her fate, are revealed to be deeply linked with the fate of the realm
In its predecessor, these storylines ran broadly in tandem. In the conclusion, they come together. Like the original series, the protagonist's choices and her fate are shown to be deeply woven with the fate of the world. Her personal journey to rejoin with her daemon and regain her creativity becomes the primary conflict in a wider conflict with an controlling regime which, as such regimes always have, is striving to suppress freedom of thought, creativity and art: all the personal, rebellious ways in which people can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The book begins with the unveiling of a set of unusual openings in the makeup of the world's air: gateways that seem to open into alternate realities. An example of a opening appears to be the source of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The church, with the antagonist at its leadership, labels these openings as a challenge to the church's beliefs and endeavors to destroy them. As Lyra begins to turn away from strict reason and revert to feeling, yet, her belief that these locations must be protected – that what they stand for and their value is in some way essential – increases. "The substance, or the substance, or the vision, or the botanical realm, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a philosophical struggle between purity and knowledge is established.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
