Tings are collapsing in the last installment 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. Establishments are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from authorities, and accumulating in the offices of theocrats, the treasuries of business empires, the control of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, gradually", says merchant a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and durable are deteriorating and giving way."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Precisely what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that drives The Rose Field, which picks up where its predecessor left off. This is, reportedly, the author's last excursion into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting world he first introduced three decades past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose terrain corresponds to that of our world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the people appear and reason and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, essences in animal form; where the heavens are teeming with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, vehicles are ridden and tea is consumed, and older scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a infant in the first volume, the prequel with which the author began the series, is now a young woman: still clearly the sharp and persistent main character of the earlier books, but aged, melancholic, more careful, less certain. This restraint is intensified by her separation from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of her which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "imagination"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with marvel and peril on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in play, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the faith's ruling body, and the author's brilliantly sinister representation of rigid, procedural malice – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's relative, who faults her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of president of the Magisterium's High Council, and is determined on using his fresh influence to broaden the institution's control. Another protagonist, who saved young the heroine to refuge along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the first book, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in espionage: he is assigned to a key location to learn more about Delamare's intentions. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and valuable botanical extract which seems in some way to be the source of a societal 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 esoteric wonder, and by yet others – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a source of darkness; an insult that must be destroyed. The question of its source, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Similar to the first series, Lyra's deeds, and her fate, are shown to be deeply entwined with the destiny of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they merge. Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's movements and her fate are shown to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the universe. Her personal quest to reconnect with her companion and rediscover her vision becomes the primary conflict in a larger war with an controlling government which, as such regimes typically do, is seeking to stifle independence of reason, innovation and expression: all the internal, defiant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles
The novel begins with the discovery of a series of curious cracks in the structure of the Earth's sky: portals that seem to open into alternate realities. One such opening manifests to be the point of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The authority, with its leader at its helm, classifies these portals as a threat to the church's orthodoxy and aims to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to shift from strict logic and back to instinct, nevertheless, her conviction that these locations must be defended – that their significance and what they offer is somehow crucial – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a Blakean conflict between naivety and knowledge is set.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
