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Tings are falling apart in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, in this volume especially, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is draining from governments, and accumulating in the halls of religious leaders, the treasuries of conglomerates, the hands of crowds. "Some force is at work, stealthily, gradually", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and strong are deteriorating and failing."

Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey

Just what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that drives The Rose Field, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, according to many, the author's final venture into the carefully crafted, deeply captivating world he first introduced 30 years ago, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose landscape aligns with that of the real world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans appear and reason and act like us, but are paired by external spirits, essences in creature form; where the air are teeming with witches and gryphons, but below, transports are caught and tea is sipped, and older academics carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in the first volume, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a young woman: still recognisably the spiky and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, more sorrowful, more careful, more doubtful. This restraint is heightened by her division from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.

Interwoven Plots

The daemon's resolve to depart in quest of that youthful part of her which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "imagination"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a wandering voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, encountering with marvel and peril on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the church's controlling power, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister embodiment of strict, bureaucratic malice – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Marcel Delamare – Lyra's uncle, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the office of head of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his fresh influence to extend the church's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who saved infant Lyra to security along a swollen river as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a secondary role in espionage: he is dispatched to the city to learn more about his intentions. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly rose oil which appears mysteriously to be the cause of a social and economic upheaval spreading out from that area. The oil is regarded by certain groups as a marketable product, by others as a research-based or esoteric miracle, and by yet others – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a source of malevolence; an affront that must be destroyed. The dilemma of where it comes from, its meaning, and if it should be removed or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.

Similar to the first series, our protagonist's decisions, and her future, are demonstrated to be inextricably connected with the fate of the realm

In its predecessor, these plots ran mostly in parallel. In The Rose Field, they come together. Similar to the first trilogy, Lyra's actions and her destiny are revealed to be inextricably entwined with the future of the realm. Her private mission to reunite with her soul and rediscover her vision becomes the key battleground in a broader battle with an authoritarian regime which, as these systems typically do, is seeking to quell autonomy of thought, innovation and culture: all the internal, resistant ways in which individuals can be liberated.

Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles

The novel opens with the finding of a series of curious fissures in the makeup of the Earth's sky: portals that look to open into other worlds. A particular portal appears to be the source of the much debated rose oil. The church, with the antagonist at its leadership, designates these windows as a challenge to the institution's doctrine and endeavors to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from inflexible logic and revert to intuition, however, her conviction that these sites must be preserved – that what they stand for and their value is in some way essential – strengthens. "The substance, or rose oil, or the vision, or the field of roses, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a poetic conflict between naivety and maturity is prepared.

Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth

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