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Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, in this volume especially, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reassembling themselves along new and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is shifting from governments, and pooling in the halls of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the hands of rioters. "Something is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and durable are deteriorating and collapsing."

Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path

Precisely what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that propels The Rose Field, which resumes where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, according to many, the author's last venture into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling realm he first unveiled three decades past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a world whose landscape corresponds to that of our world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and think and act like us, but are accompanied by daemons, souls in animal form; where the skies are populated with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but below, vehicles are caught and beverages is consumed, and older academics carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a infant in the prequel, the prequel with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still distinctly the sharp and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is amplified by her separation from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.

Interwoven Plots

His choice to depart in quest of that youthful part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "vision"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which chronicled Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, encountering with marvel and risk on the way. But from the start, deeper currents were in action, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the church's controlling power, and Pullman's masterfully eerie incarnation of austere, administrative evil – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. The antagonist – our protagonist's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of head of the church's ruling assembly, and is set on using his fresh power to broaden the religion's dominium. Another protagonist, who rescued young Lyra to refuge along a flooded river as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in spycraft: he is dispatched to the city to learn more about his intentions. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and valuable botanical extract which appears in some way to be the origin of a societal and financial upheaval rippling out from the region. The substance is viewed by certain groups as a tradeable product, by different parties as a empirical or mystical phenomenon, and by others still – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a source of darkness; an affront that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its origins, what it stands for, and whether it should be destroyed or protected is becoming urgent.

Similar to the first series, the heroine's decisions, and her destiny, are revealed to be inseparably linked with the destiny of the world

In its predecessor, these plots ran broadly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they converge. Like His Dark Materials, the protagonist's actions and her destiny are revealed to be inseparably linked with the fate of the universe. Her individual journey to reconnect with her companion and regain her imagination becomes the central battleground in a broader war with an controlling government which, as such regimes typically do, is striving to stifle autonomy of reason, originality and expression: all the personal, resistant ways in which humans can be independent.

Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts

The story begins with the finding of a collection of strange fissures in the structure of the world's atmosphere: gateways that appear to lead to different dimensions. An example of a opening appears to be the source of the much debated mystical extract. The church, with Delamare at its helm, designates these windows as a problem to the religion's beliefs and sets out to destroy them. As Lyra begins to turn away from rigid logic and return to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these locations must be defended – that their significance and their value is in some way crucial – grows. "The substance, or the substance, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a poetic conflict between innocence and knowledge is established.

Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution

At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the