Tings are falling apart in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the next of the author's grand trilogies set in a realm that seems, now more than ever, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reassembling themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from governments, and gathering in the offices of religious leaders, the vaults of conglomerates, the hands of crowds. "An element is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and solid are deteriorating and giving way."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that drives this final volume, which continues where the previous book left off. This is, by all accounts, the author's concluding excursion into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling realm he first unveiled in the distant past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose landscape aligns with that of the real world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the humans appear and think and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, souls in animal form; where the heavens are populated with witches and gryphons, but beneath those skies, buses are taken and tea is consumed, and mature scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still clearly the spiky and tenacious heroine of the previous installments, but aged, sadder, more cautious, less certain. This restraint is amplified by her split from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to depart in search of that youthful part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an quality which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which followed Lyra undertake a picaresque trek across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and peril on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the faith's ruling body, and the author's brilliantly sinister representation of austere, administrative wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's family member, who blames her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the office of head of the church's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his recently acquired power to extend the institution's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who saved infant the heroine to refuge along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is sent to a key location to learn more about his plans. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and costly essential oil which manifests somehow to be the cause of a societal and economic disturbance spreading out from Central Asia. The oil is regarded by certain groups as a commercial commodity, by others as a empirical or spiritual wonder, and by others still – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a source of evil; an challenge that must be eradicated. The issue of its origins, its meaning, and whether it should be removed or protected is escalating in importance.
Similar to the first series, our protagonist's decisions, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be inextricably connected with the fate of the world
In the previous volume, these plots ran largely in parallel. In this final book, they converge. As in the original series, her actions and her path are revealed to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the world. Her private mission to rejoin with her companion and regain her vision becomes the central struggle in a broader battle with an oppressive government which, as such authorities always have, is seeking to stifle autonomy of thinking, innovation and expression: all the internal, resistant ways in which humans can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The novel starts with the discovery of a series of curious fissures in the fabric of the planet's sky: portals that look to open into other worlds. A particular opening appears to be the source of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The church, with Delamare at its head, classifies these portals as a challenge to the institution's beliefs and endeavors to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to shift from inflexible rationalism and revert to feeling, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be preserved – that what they stand for and their value is somehow vital – grows. "The substance, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the Rose Field, or whatever we label it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a philosophical tussle between naivety and knowledge is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
