Tings are unraveling in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a world that seems, here more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Establishments are failing, or reassembling themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from states, and pooling in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of conglomerates, the control of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, gradually", says trader a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and durable are faltering and failing."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the question that propels this final volume, which resumes where its predecessor left off. This is, according to many, the author's last excursion into the carefully crafted, deeply captivating universe he first revealed in the distant past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose terrain maps on to that of the real world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the people look and reason and act like us, but are paired by animal souls, souls in animal form; where the air are filled with witches and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, buses are taken and beverages is sipped, and mature scholars carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still recognisably the spiky and determined heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, less sure. This circumscription is amplified by her split from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to leave in quest of that childlike part of her which she may have forgotten (an quality which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which followed Lyra undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, meeting with wonder and danger on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in action, and sinister powers at work. The church authority – the church's controlling power, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister embodiment of austere, procedural wickedness – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. The antagonist – Lyra's relative, who faults her for his sister's death – has positioned himself into the role of leader of the authority's High Council, and is intent on using his newfound influence to broaden the church's dominium. Another protagonist, who rescued baby Lyra to safety along a swollen river as an young boy in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in espionage: he is dispatched to Geneva to find out more about Delamare's aims. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and precious rose oil which seems somehow to be the source of a societal and economic upheaval emanating out from the region. The oil is seen by various factions as a tradeable commodity, by different parties as a research-based or esoteric wonder, and by further factions – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a origin of darkness; an insult that must be obliterated. The issue of its source, what it stands for, and if it should be destroyed or protected is escalating in importance.
As in the first series, our protagonist's deeds, and her fate, are demonstrated to be deeply linked with the future of the world
In its predecessor, these narratives ran broadly in tandem. In this final book, they merge. As in His Dark Materials, the protagonist's actions and her fate are shown to be inseparably woven with the destiny of the universe. Her individual mission to rejoin with her soul and recover her creativity becomes the key struggle in a broader war with an controlling regime which, as these systems typically do, is striving to suppress independence of thinking, originality and expression: all the inner, rebellious ways in which people can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The story opens with the discovery of a series of curious openings in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: portals that appear to lead to different dimensions. One such portal appears to be the point of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The authority, with its leader at its leadership, designates these openings as a problem to the institution's beliefs and endeavors to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to move from strict reason and back to feeling, however, her conviction that these places must be defended – that their meaning and what they offer is somehow crucial – grows. "Dust, or the substance, or the imagination, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a Blakean conflict between purity and maturity is set.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
