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Things are unraveling in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that manifests, now more than ever, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Establishments are failing, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from authorities, and pooling in the chambers of religious leaders, the treasuries of corporations, the grasp of rioters. "Something is at work, silently, gradually", says merchant a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and strong are deteriorating and giving way."

Key Puzzle and Her Quest

Just what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the question that drives the concluding book, which picks up where its predecessor concluded. This is, according to many, the author's last excursion into the intricately constructed, endlessly enchanting world he first unveiled in the distant past, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a world whose geography corresponds to that of the real world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the humans appear and reason and behave like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, essences in beast form; where the skies are filled with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but below, transports are taken and tea is drunk, and mature professors carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still distinctly the sharp and determined heroine of the previous installments, but aged, melancholic, more careful, less certain. This limitation is heightened by her division from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.

Converging Storylines

Pan's decision to leave in quest of that youthful part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an quality which he represents as her "imagination"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which saw Lyra undertake a wandering voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, meeting with marvel and peril on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the faith's ruling body, and the author's masterfully eerie representation of austere, administrative wickedness – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's family member, who faults her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of leader of the church's High Council, and is intent on using his fresh power to broaden the institution's dominium. Another protagonist, who saved young Lyra to security along a swollen river as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a sideline in spycraft: he is dispatched to the city to find out more about the antagonist's plans. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and costly botanical extract which appears somehow to be the source of a societal and economic upheaval rippling out from Central Asia. The substance is regarded by various factions as a commercial commodity, by others as a scientific or spiritual wonder, and by others still – the zealous "highland figures" – as a origin of darkness; an insult that must be destroyed. The issue of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be removed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.

As in the first series, Lyra's actions, and her future, are demonstrated to be inseparably entwined with the fate of the realm

In its predecessor, these storylines ran largely in side by side. In The Rose Field, they converge. Like His Dark Materials, the protagonist's actions and her destiny are unveiled to be inseparably entwined with the future of the realm. Her personal journey to reconnect with her soul and rediscover her creativity becomes the central conflict in a larger war with an authoritarian government which, as such authorities always have, is striving to suppress autonomy of reason, innovation and expression: all the personal, resistant ways in which humans can be liberated.

Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts

The novel starts with the finding of a collection of curious openings in the makeup of the Earth's atmosphere: gateways that seem to lead to different dimensions. An example of a window seems to be the point of the much debated botanical substance. The authority, with Delamare at its head, designates these windows as a threat to the religion's orthodoxy and aims to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from strict logic and return to feeling, nevertheless, her certainty that these sites must be defended – that their significance and what they offer is in some way vital – grows. "Dust, or rose oil, or the vision, or the botanical realm, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a philosophical tussle between purity and experience is established.

Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth

At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the