Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that appears, here more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Organizations are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along new and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from states, and accumulating in the offices of theocrats, the coffers of conglomerates, the control of rioters. "Something is at work, silently, gradually", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his post in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and durable are faltering and giving way."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Exactly what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the mystery that propels The Rose Field, which continues where the previous book ended. This is, reportedly, the author's last foray into the elaborately built, deeply captivating world he first unveiled three decades past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose geography aligns with that of our world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the humans appear and think and act like us, but are joined by daemons, beings in creature form; where the air are teeming with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, vehicles are caught and drinks is sipped, and middle-aged scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in the prequel, the prequel with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the sharp and determined main character of the prior volumes, but aged, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is heightened by her split from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to leave in pursuit of that innocent part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an trait which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which followed Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and peril on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of rigid, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. The antagonist – our protagonist's relative, who faults her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the office of leader of the Magisterium's governing body, and is determined on using his fresh power to expand the church's control. Malcolm Polstead, who saved young Lyra to refuge along a flooded Thames as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a sideline in spycraft: he is dispatched to a key location to find out more about Delamare's aims. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and precious essential oil which manifests in some way to be the cause of a social and financial upheaval rippling out from that area. The oil is regarded by some as a marketable commodity, by others as a empirical or spiritual phenomenon, and by others still – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a origin of evil; an insult that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its source, what it stands for, and whether it should be eliminated or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
Similar to His Dark Materials, the heroine's actions, and her future, are demonstrated to be deeply connected with the future of the universe
In the previous volume, these narratives ran broadly in parallel. In The Rose Field, they come together. Like the original series, Lyra's actions and her destiny are unveiled to be inseparably entwined with the fate of the universe. Her private journey to reunite with her companion and rediscover her imagination becomes the key battleground in a broader conflict with an oppressive system which, as such regimes always have, is seeking to quell freedom of thinking, creativity and art: all the inner, rebellious ways in which people can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The novel begins with the finding of a series of unusual fissures in the makeup of the Earth's sky: windows that appear to open into other worlds. A particular opening seems to be the source of the highly contested botanical substance. The Magisterium, with its leader at its head, labels these openings as a challenge to the church's orthodoxy and endeavors to destroy them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict reason and revert to intuition, yet, her certainty that these locations must be preserved – that their significance and what they provide is somehow vital – increases. "Dust, or the extract, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a philosophical tussle between innocence and knowledge is established.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
