Things are unraveling in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that seems, here more than ever, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Organizations are failing, or restructuring themselves along new and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from authorities, and gathering in the chambers of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the grasp of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, gradually", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are faltering and giving way."
Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that propels this final volume, which continues where the previous book ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's concluding excursion into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating universe he first introduced in the distant past, with the launch of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose terrain maps on to that of our world, but whose past diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals look and reason and act like us, but are joined by animal souls, essences in animal form; where the heavens are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are taken and drinks is consumed, and mature academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still recognisably the spiky and persistent heroine of the prior volumes, but aged, melancholic, more careful, less sure. This restraint is amplified by her separation from her animal guide, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to depart in search of that youthful part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a wandering trek across Europe and into the mountain region, encountering with wonder and peril on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in motion, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the faith's controlling power, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of austere, administrative wickedness – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. The antagonist – Lyra's relative, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of head of the authority's governing body, and is set on using his fresh authority to broaden the church's dominium. A key character, who carried infant the heroine to safety along a overflowing river as an young boy in the first book, is now an academic with a sideline in intelligence work: he is assigned to a key location to learn more about his aims. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and costly botanical extract which manifests in some way to be the cause of a social and financial upheaval spreading out from the region. The extract is regarded by some as a commercial product, by alternate groups as a research-based or mystical phenomenon, and by others still – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of evil; an insult that must be destroyed. The question of its origins, what it stands for, and whether it should be destroyed or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in the first series, our protagonist's actions, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be deeply entwined with the fate of the realm
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran largely in tandem. In this final book, they come together. Similar to the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her destiny are shown to be deeply woven with the destiny of the realm. Her personal quest to reunite with her companion and regain her vision becomes the primary battleground in a wider battle with an controlling system which, as such regimes typically do, is seeking to stifle autonomy of reason, creativity and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which individuals can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The story opens with the finding of a set of curious cracks in the makeup of the planet's atmosphere: portals that appear to open into other worlds. An example of a portal appears to be the source of the highly contested botanical substance. The authority, with its leader at its leadership, classifies these windows as a challenge to the religion's doctrine and sets out to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to shift from rigid reason and revert to intuition, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be protected – that their significance and what they offer is in some way crucial – strengthens. "Dust, or the extract, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a philosophical conflict between naivety and experience is set.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
