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Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a realm that manifests, here more than ever, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Establishments are failing, or reassembling themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from governments, and accumulating in the chambers of religious leaders, the treasuries of business empires, the hands of crowds. "Some force is at work, very quietly, gradually", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and solid are weakening and giving way."

The Central Mystery and Her Quest

Exactly what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that animates the concluding book, which picks up where the previous book ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's final excursion into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting realm he first introduced in the distant past, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose terrain maps on to that of this world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the people appear and reason and act like us, but are joined by daemons, souls in beast form; where the heavens are filled with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are caught and tea is consumed, and older academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still distinctly the spiky and determined main character of the prior volumes, but aged, sadder, warier, less sure. This limitation is heightened by her division from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.

Merging Narratives

Pan's decision to depart in quest of that youthful part of her which she may have forgotten (an trait which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw the protagonist undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the mountain region, encountering with amazement and danger on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The religious council – the faith's controlling power, and the author's brilliantly sinister representation of rigid, procedural evil – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's uncle, who blames her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the position of president of the authority's ruling assembly, and is set on using his fresh influence to broaden the institution's dominium. A key character, who carried young the heroine to safety along a overflowing Thames as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an academic with a secondary role in spycraft: he is dispatched to the city to discover more about the antagonist's plans. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and precious botanical extract which appears mysteriously to be the cause of a social and economic crisis emanating out from Central Asia. The extract is viewed by some as a commercial good, by others as a research-based or esoteric wonder, and by further factions – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a source of evil; an challenge that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its origins, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or preserved is coming rapidly to the fore.

Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions, and her destiny, are shown to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the universe

In its predecessor, these storylines ran largely in parallel. In this final book, they converge. Like His Dark Materials, her movements and her destiny are revealed to be inseparably linked with the destiny of the universe. Her individual mission to rejoin with her soul and rediscover her creativity becomes the primary struggle in a broader war with an authoritarian system which, as such authorities often attempt, is attempting to suppress independence of thinking, creativity and expression: all the internal, resistant ways in which humans can be free.

Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts

The book opens with the unveiling of a series of unusual fissures in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: portals that appear to lead to different dimensions. One such portal appears to be the point of the highly contested mystical extract. The authority, with the antagonist at its leadership, designates these portals as a problem to the church's doctrine and aims to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from strict rationalism and back to intuition, however, her certainty that these places must be defended – that what they stand for and what they offer is somehow essential – increases. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a Blakean tussle between innocence and experience is established.

Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution

At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the