Tings are collapsing in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that appears, here more than ever, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reorganizing themselves along new and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from states, and accumulating in the offices of theocrats, the coffers of corporations, the control of rioters. "Some force is at work, silently, very subtly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and durable are deteriorating and giving way."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that propels this final volume, which resumes where its predecessor ended. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding excursion into the elaborately built, deeply captivating realm he first revealed 30 years ago, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a world whose terrain maps on to that of our world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the people look and reason and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, souls in beast form; where the heavens are populated with witches and legendary creatures, but below, transports are caught and drinks is consumed, and mature scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the first volume, the prequel with which Pullman began the series, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the sharp and tenacious main character of the earlier books, but older, more sorrowful, more cautious, less sure. This limitation is intensified by her split from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to leave in pursuit of that childlike part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an quality which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which followed Lyra undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, encountering with amazement and peril on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in action, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of rigid, bureaucratic wickedness – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who blames her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of leader of the authority's High Council, and is intent on using his newfound influence to expand the religion's control. Malcolm Polstead, who carried baby the heroine to safety along a swollen Thames as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in espionage: he is dispatched to a key location to learn more about the antagonist's intentions. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and costly essential oil which manifests somehow to be the source of a social and financial crisis emanating out from Central Asia. The substance is seen by some as a commercial good, by different parties as a research-based or mystical miracle, and by further factions – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a source of evil; an challenge that must be eradicated. The issue of its origins, its significance, and if it should be destroyed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, our protagonist's decisions, and her fate, are revealed to be deeply entwined with the future of the universe
In the previous volume, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In the conclusion, they come together. As in the original series, her choices and her fate are unveiled to be inextricably entwined with the future of the world. Her private journey to rejoin with her soul and rediscover her vision becomes the central struggle in a broader war with an authoritarian government which, as such authorities always have, is attempting to quell freedom of thinking, innovation and art: all the inner, defiant ways in which people can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The story begins with the discovery of a collection of strange fissures in the structure of the Earth's sky: gateways that appear to open into other worlds. One such window appears to be the origin of the much debated rose oil. The church, with its leader at its head, designates these openings as a problem to the religion's orthodoxy and aims to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to shift from inflexible rationalism and return to feeling, yet, her certainty that these locations must be protected – that what they stand for and what they offer is somehow crucial – increases. "The substance, or rose oil, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a Blakean tussle between naivety and maturity is set.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
