Things are falling apart in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that appears, here more than ever, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from authorities, and gathering in the chambers of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the hands of crowds. "Some force is at work, silently, very subtly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and solid are deteriorating and collapsing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Exactly what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that animates this final volume, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth concluded. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final foray into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating world he first revealed in the distant past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose terrain corresponds to that of this world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans look and reason and behave like us, but are accompanied by daemons, souls in creature form; where the heavens are filled with enchantresses and gryphons, but underneath, buses are taken and beverages is consumed, and middle-aged academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still recognisably the spiky and determined main character of the previous installments, but older, sadder, more cautious, less sure. This restraint is amplified by her separation from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to go off in search of that youthful part of her which she appears to have shed (an trait which he represents as her "creativity"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which followed the protagonist undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the Caucasus, encountering with wonder and risk on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the faith's governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of rigid, administrative evil – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's family member, who faults her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of head of the authority's High Council, and is set on using his fresh authority to expand the church's control. A key character, who carried baby the heroine to refuge along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is assigned to Geneva to discover more about Delamare's intentions. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and valuable rose oil which seems somehow to be the origin of a social and economic crisis spreading out from the region. The substance is regarded by certain groups as a commercial commodity, by alternate groups as a research-based or spiritual miracle, and by others still – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an affront that must be eradicated. The question of where it comes from, its meaning, and if it should be eliminated or preserved is becoming urgent.
As in the original trilogy, the heroine's decisions, and her destiny, are revealed to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the world
In its predecessor, these plots ran broadly in side by side. In this final book, they converge. Similar to the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her path are unveiled to be inextricably entwined with the destiny of the realm. Her private mission to reconnect with her daemon and rediscover her imagination becomes the key conflict in a wider battle with an authoritarian system which, as such regimes typically do, is attempting to stifle freedom of thinking, creativity and culture: all the personal, defiant ways in which people can be free.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The novel starts with the finding of a set of unusual cracks in the structure of the planet's air: windows that appear to open into other worlds. One such opening seems to be the source of the much debated rose oil. The Magisterium, with its leader at its helm, labels these portals as a challenge to the institution's orthodoxy and endeavors to destroy them. As the heroine begins to move from rigid rationalism and revert to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these sites must be preserved – that their meaning and what they offer is somehow vital – increases. "Dust, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a poetic tussle between purity and knowledge is prepared.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
