Things are unraveling in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that manifests, in this volume especially, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reassembling themselves along novel and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from authorities, and gathering in the halls of theocrats, the treasuries of conglomerates, the hands of rioters. "Something is at work, very quietly, gradually", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and strong are weakening and failing."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Exactly what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that propels The Rose Field, which continues where its predecessor concluded. This is, according to many, the author's concluding excursion into the elaborately built, deeply captivating realm he first revealed three decades past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose landscape maps on to that of the real world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the people look and reason and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, essences in animal form; where the heavens are filled with witches and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are ridden and drinks is consumed, and middle-aged professors carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still clearly the sharp and tenacious main character of the previous installments, but more mature, sadder, more cautious, more doubtful. This circumscription is intensified by her separation from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
The daemon's resolve to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of her which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "vision"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across Europe and into the Caucasus, encountering with wonder and peril on the way. But from the outset, deeper currents were in motion, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the religious controlling power, and Pullman's deliciously chilling embodiment of strict, bureaucratic wickedness – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's family member, who blames her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of head of the church's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his newfound power to broaden the institution's rule. Another protagonist, who carried baby the heroine to safety along a overflowing Thames as an child in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is assigned to a key location to discover more about his aims. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and valuable botanical extract which appears in some way to be the source of a social and economic upheaval emanating out from Central Asia. The extract is viewed by various factions as a tradeable commodity, by others as a research-based or esoteric phenomenon, and by further factions – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a origin of evil; an challenge that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its source, its significance, and whether it should be removed or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in the first series, Lyra's deeds, and her destiny, are revealed to be inseparably connected with the fate of the realm
In The Secret Commonwealth, these storylines ran mostly in side by side. In the conclusion, they merge. As in His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions and her fate are revealed to be deeply woven with the destiny of the universe. Her private journey to reconnect with her daemon and rediscover her vision becomes the primary battleground in a wider battle with an oppressive regime which, as these systems always have, is attempting to quell independence of reason, originality and art: all the internal, defiant ways in which humans can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The novel begins with the discovery of a set of strange cracks in the makeup of the planet's sky: windows that seem to lead to other worlds. An example of a window appears to be the source of the highly contested botanical substance. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its leadership, designates these openings as a challenge to the institution's doctrine and sets out to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to move from strict reason and back to instinct, yet, her belief that these sites must be protected – that what they stand for and what they provide is mysteriously vital – grows. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or whatever we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a philosophical conflict between purity and experience is established.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
