Tings are unraveling in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a realm that manifests, in this volume especially, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or restructuring themselves along new and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is draining from governments, and accumulating in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the grasp of mobs. "Something is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and durable are deteriorating and giving way."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that propels the concluding book, which continues where the previous book left off. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final excursion into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling universe he first introduced 30 years ago, with the launch of Northern Lights. It's a world whose geography maps on to that of this world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and reason and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, souls in creature form; where the air are populated with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, transports are caught and tea is sipped, and mature professors carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a child in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in the first volume, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the sharp and determined main character of the prior volumes, but older, sadder, warier, more doubtful. This restraint is intensified by her separation from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to depart in search of that childlike part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "creativity"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque journey across the continent and into the Caucasus, encountering with marvel and risk on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in action, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling representation of strict, procedural evil – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. The antagonist – our protagonist's family member, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the position of president of the authority's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his recently acquired influence to expand the church's rule. A key character, who carried baby Lyra to security along a swollen Thames as an child in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in spycraft: he is dispatched to a key location to find out more about Delamare's aims. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and precious essential oil which seems in some way to be the cause of a social and economic upheaval spreading out from the region. The oil is regarded by some as a tradeable product, by different parties as a empirical or spiritual wonder, and by yet others – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of evil; an insult that must be destroyed. The issue of where it comes from, its significance, and if it should be destroyed or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
As in the first series, the heroine's actions, and her destiny, are revealed to be deeply linked with the fate of the realm
In its predecessor, these plots ran largely in side by side. In the conclusion, they converge. Like the first trilogy, her choices and her path are revealed to be deeply entwined with the future of the world. Her private mission to reunite with her soul and regain her vision becomes the central battleground in a broader conflict with an authoritarian regime which, as such authorities typically do, is seeking to suppress autonomy of thought, creativity and art: all the personal, defiant ways in which people can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The novel begins with the discovery of a series of strange fissures in the makeup of the planet's sky: windows that seem to lead to different dimensions. A particular window seems to be the source of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The church, with its leader at its head, labels these portals as a problem to the religion's orthodoxy and endeavors to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from rigid rationalism and back to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be defended – that what they stand for and their value is somehow essential – grows. "Dust, or the extract, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a Blakean struggle between purity and knowledge is established.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
