Things are unraveling in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a realm that manifests, now more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reassembling themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from authorities, and pooling in the chambers of religious leaders, the vaults of corporations, the hands of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says trader a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his post in an city cafe. "Things we thought were firm and strong are weakening and failing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that animates the concluding book, which picks up where the previous book concluded. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's final foray into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling universe he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose geography aligns with that of this world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the people appear and think and act like us, but are joined by animal souls, beings in creature form; where the heavens are teeming with witches and gryphons, but underneath, vehicles are ridden and tea is drunk, and older professors carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still clearly the sharp and tenacious main character of the earlier books, but aged, sadder, more careful, less sure. This circumscription is intensified by her split from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to depart in quest of that innocent part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he represents as her "creativity"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which saw the protagonist undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and risk on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister incarnation of strict, bureaucratic wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's uncle, who blames her for his sister's death – has positioned himself into the office of president of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is set on using his recently acquired authority to broaden the church's control. A key character, who rescued infant the heroine to refuge along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in espionage: he is assigned to the city to find out more about his aims. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and valuable botanical extract which manifests mysteriously to be the source of a social and financial crisis spreading out from the region. The oil is regarded by some as a commercial product, by different parties as a research-based or esoteric wonder, and by further factions – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a origin of darkness; an affront that must be destroyed. The question of its origins, its significance, and if it should be eliminated or protected is escalating in importance.
Like the first series, the heroine's decisions, and her destiny, are shown to be deeply connected with the destiny of the realm
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran mostly in tandem. In this final book, they converge. As in the original series, Lyra's choices and her fate are unveiled to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the realm. Her private mission to rejoin with her daemon and recover her imagination becomes the central battleground in a wider battle with an controlling government which, as such authorities typically do, is seeking to quell freedom of thought, creativity and culture: all the inner, rebellious ways in which people can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The novel begins with the discovery of a series of strange fissures in the fabric of the world's sky: gateways that appear to give on to other worlds. One such opening seems to be the origin of the much debated mystical extract. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its leadership, classifies these portals as a challenge to the church's beliefs and endeavors to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to move from rigid rationalism and revert to intuition, nevertheless, her belief that these sites must be preserved – that their meaning and what they offer is in some way essential – grows. "The substance, or the extract, or the vision, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a philosophical conflict between naivety and maturity is set.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
