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Things are unraveling in the last installment of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a realm that appears, in this volume especially, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is shifting from governments, and gathering in the halls of religious leaders, the vaults of corporations, the control of rioters. "An element is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were stable and durable are weakening and giving way."

Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey

Just what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that animates the concluding book, which continues where its predecessor left off. This is, according to many, Pullman's concluding venture into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling realm he first revealed three decades past, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose geography maps on to that of this world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the people appear and think and act like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, essences in animal form; where the air are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, buses are caught and tea is consumed, and middle-aged professors carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a child in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still recognisably the spiky and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but more mature, melancholic, warier, more doubtful. This limitation is amplified by her split from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.

Interwoven Plots

Pan's decision to depart in quest of that innocent part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an trait which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, meeting with amazement and peril on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the church's controlling power, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of rigid, procedural wickedness – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's relative, who faults her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the office of president of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his newfound power to broaden the institution's dominium. Another protagonist, who carried baby the heroine to safety along a swollen river as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an academic with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is dispatched to a key location to discover more about his plans. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and valuable essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a societal and financial disturbance rippling out from the region. The oil is viewed by various factions as a tradeable good, by others as a empirical or mystical phenomenon, and by yet others – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an insult that must be destroyed. The issue of where it comes from, what it stands for, and if it should be removed or protected is escalating in importance.

Similar to His Dark Materials, our protagonist's decisions, and her destiny, are shown to be inextricably linked with the future of the universe

In its predecessor, these plots ran largely in side by side. In The Rose Field, they converge. As in the original series, the protagonist's movements and her fate are shown to be inextricably woven with the fate of the world. Her private quest to reunite with her companion and rediscover her creativity becomes the key battleground in a broader conflict with an authoritarian regime which, as these systems always have, is seeking to quell independence of thinking, creativity and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which people can be independent.

Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles

The book starts with the discovery of a collection of unusual openings in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: portals that seem to give on to different dimensions. A particular window manifests to be the origin of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The church, with its leader at its leadership, classifies these windows as a threat to the church's beliefs and endeavors to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict logic and return to feeling, yet, her certainty that these places must be defended – that their meaning and their value is somehow crucial – strengthens. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or no matter what we call it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a poetic conflict between naivety and knowledge is set.

Narrative Pacing and Personal Evolution

At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the