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Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the next of the author's grand trilogies set in a realm that appears, in this volume especially, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reassembling themselves along new and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from governments, and accumulating in the halls of theocrats, the treasuries of conglomerates, the grasp of mobs. "Some force is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says merchant a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and durable are weakening and giving way."

Key Puzzle and Her Quest

Precisely what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that propels this final volume, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, according to many, the author's final foray into the intricately constructed, endlessly enchanting realm he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose terrain aligns with that of the real world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the humans look and think and act like us, but are paired by external spirits, beings in creature form; where the heavens are filled with sorceresses and gryphons, but underneath, transports are ridden and beverages is sipped, and mature academics carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which the author began the series, is now a young woman: still recognisably the spiky and tenacious main character of the earlier books, but aged, more sorrowful, more cautious, less sure. This circumscription is intensified by her separation from her animal guide, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.

Converging Storylines

His choice to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an quality which he represents as her "imagination"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed Lyra undertake a picaresque journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, encountering with amazement and peril on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the faith's governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of austere, procedural wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – the heroine's family member, who faults her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of leader of the authority's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his recently acquired authority to broaden the institution's rule. Another protagonist, who saved baby the heroine to security along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an academic with a additional duty in espionage: he is dispatched to Geneva to find out more about Delamare's aims. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly essential oil which manifests mysteriously to be the cause of a social and economic upheaval emanating out from the region. The oil is regarded by various factions as a marketable commodity, by different parties as a empirical or spiritual miracle, and by yet others – the zealous "highland figures" – as a wellspring of evil; an affront that must be eradicated. The question of where it comes from, what it stands for, and if it should be eliminated or safeguarded is becoming urgent.

Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions, and her future, are demonstrated to be deeply connected with the fate of the world

In the previous volume, these plots ran mostly in side by side. In the conclusion, they converge. As in the original series, Lyra's movements and her path are shown to be inseparably woven with the destiny of the realm. Her personal journey to reunite with her daemon and recover her vision becomes the central conflict in a larger conflict with an oppressive government which, as such authorities often attempt, is seeking to suppress independence of reason, innovation and culture: all the personal, defiant ways in which people can be liberated.

Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts

The story starts with the discovery of a collection of strange openings in the structure of the world's air: windows that look to give on to alternate realities. An example of a portal appears to be the source of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with Delamare at its head, classifies these windows as a challenge to the religion's beliefs and aims to destroy them. As the heroine begins to turn away from strict logic and return to feeling, yet, her belief that these locations must be protected – that their meaning and their value is mysteriously crucial – grows. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a philosophical struggle between naivety and knowledge is established.

Plot Rhythm and Character Development

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