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Things are falling apart in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that manifests, here more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Establishments are failing, or restructuring themselves along new and troubling lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from states, and pooling in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of business empires, the control of mobs. "An element is at work, very quietly, gradually", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were firm and strong are deteriorating and failing."

Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey

Precisely what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that propels The Rose Field, which picks up where its predecessor left off. This is, according to many, the author's final excursion into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling realm he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and think and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, essences in animal form; where the air are filled with sorceresses and gryphons, but beneath those skies, transports are taken and drinks is consumed, and older scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first encountered as a child in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in the first volume, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a adult: still clearly the spiky and tenacious main character of the prior volumes, but aged, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is amplified by her division from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.

Converging Storylines

Pan's decision to go off in quest of that youthful part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw the protagonist undertake a adventurous journey across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with amazement and risk on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the religious controlling power, and the author's deliciously chilling embodiment of austere, administrative evil – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – Lyra's relative, who blames her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of president of the authority's governing body, and is determined on using his recently acquired power to expand the institution's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who carried infant Lyra to security along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an academic with a additional duty in spycraft: he is dispatched to the city to learn more about his intentions. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and costly essential oil which manifests in some way to be the cause of a societal and financial crisis rippling out from Central Asia. The extract is viewed by various factions as a tradeable commodity, by alternate groups as a empirical or spiritual phenomenon, and by further factions – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a source of malevolence; an challenge that must be obliterated. The issue of where it comes from, what it stands for, and if it should be removed or protected is escalating in importance.

As in His Dark Materials, our protagonist's deeds, and her fate, are revealed to be deeply linked with the future of the realm

In its predecessor, these narratives ran broadly in side by side. In the conclusion, they merge. Like the original series, her choices and her path are shown to be inextricably linked with the fate of the world. Her private journey to reunite with her companion and regain her creativity becomes the key struggle in a larger war with an oppressive government which, as such authorities often attempt, is seeking to quell independence of thought, innovation and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which people can be liberated.

Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles

The book begins with the finding of a collection of strange openings in the structure of the Earth's sky: portals that look to open into different dimensions. A particular window appears to be the source of the much debated botanical substance. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its leadership, classifies these portals as a problem to the religion's beliefs and aims to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from strict reason and revert to feeling, however, her belief that these sites must be preserved – that their significance and their value is in some way vital – strengthens. "Dust, or the substance, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we call it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a philosophical conflict between innocence and maturity is established.

Narrative Pacing and Personal Evolution

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