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Things are unraveling in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, here more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Establishments are failing, or restructuring themselves along novel and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is draining from governments, and pooling in the offices of religious leaders, the coffers of conglomerates, the hands of rioters. "An element is at work, silently, gradually", says businessman a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and strong are deteriorating and giving way."

Core Enigma and Her Quest

Precisely what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that drives the concluding book, which picks up where its predecessor left off. This is, by all accounts, the author's last excursion into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting realm he first introduced three decades past, with the launch of Northern Lights. 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 appear and think and act like us, but are joined by animal souls, souls in beast form; where the air are populated with witches and gryphons, but below, transports are taken and beverages is drunk, and mature professors carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the first volume, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a adult: still clearly the sharp and determined protagonist of the earlier books, but older, sadder, warier, less certain. This circumscription is heightened by her separation from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.

Merging Narratives

His choice to depart in pursuit of that childlike part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an trait which he represents as her "vision"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which followed Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, meeting with wonder and peril on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in play, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the religious ruling body, and the author's brilliantly sinister representation of rigid, administrative evil – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – Lyra's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of leader of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his newfound influence to broaden the church's rule. A key character, who carried infant the heroine to security along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the first book, is now an university scholar with a sideline in intelligence work: he is dispatched to a key location to learn more about his intentions. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and costly botanical extract which manifests in some way to be the origin of a societal and financial crisis spreading out from that area. The substance is regarded by some as a tradeable product, by alternate groups as a empirical or spiritual phenomenon, and by yet others – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a source of evil; an challenge that must be obliterated. The question of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.

Similar to the first series, the heroine's actions, and her fate, are revealed to be deeply entwined with the destiny of the world

In its predecessor, these narratives ran mostly in parallel. In The Rose Field, they come together. As in the first trilogy, Lyra's actions and her destiny are revealed to be deeply entwined with the destiny of the realm. Her personal journey to reconnect with her daemon and regain her imagination becomes the key struggle in a wider war with an controlling government which, as such authorities often attempt, is seeking to suppress autonomy of thinking, creativity and culture: all the personal, rebellious ways in which people can be free.

Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles

The story opens with the discovery of a collection of strange fissures in the fabric of the world's sky: portals that appear to open into different dimensions. A particular portal manifests to be the origin of the highly contested rose oil. The authority, with its leader at its head, designates these portals as a threat to the institution's beliefs and sets out to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict rationalism and back to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these locations must be defended – that what they stand for and what they provide is mysteriously vital – grows. "Dust, or the substance, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a Blakean struggle between purity and knowledge is established.

Plot Rhythm and Character Development

At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the