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Tings are falling apart in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a world that manifests, in this volume especially, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or restructuring themselves along novel and troubling lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from governments, and pooling in the halls of religious leaders, the coffers of conglomerates, the control of crowds. "An element is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were firm and strong are faltering and failing."

Key Puzzle and Her Quest

Just what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that propels The Rose Field, which picks up where the previous book concluded. This is, according to many, Pullman's last venture into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling realm he first introduced 30 years ago, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a world whose geography aligns with that of the real world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the humans look and think and act like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, essences in creature form; where the skies are populated with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, vehicles are ridden and beverages is drunk, and middle-aged professors carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the first volume, the prequel with which Pullman began the series, is now a adult: still distinctly the sharp and persistent heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, sadder, warier, more doubtful. This limitation is heightened by her division from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.

Interwoven Plots

The daemon's resolve to depart in quest of that childlike part of her which she appears to have shed (an trait which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw the protagonist undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the faith's governing authority, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of austere, procedural evil – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – the heroine's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has positioned himself into the office of head of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his newfound influence to expand the religion's control. A key character, who saved baby Lyra to safety along a overflowing Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an academic with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is assigned to the city to discover more about the antagonist's aims. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and precious essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a social and economic crisis emanating out from that area. The extract is seen by some as a commercial product, by alternate groups as a research-based or spiritual phenomenon, and by others still – the extremist "highland figures" – as a origin of malevolence; an challenge that must be eradicated. The question of where it comes from, its meaning, and if it should be removed or safeguarded is becoming urgent.

Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's decisions, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be inseparably connected with the destiny of the universe

In The Secret Commonwealth, these narratives ran broadly in tandem. In the conclusion, they merge. Similar to His Dark Materials, her movements and her destiny are revealed to be inextricably woven with the future of the universe. Her individual quest to rejoin with her soul and rediscover her imagination becomes the central battleground in a wider conflict with an authoritarian system which, as such regimes always have, is seeking to quell independence of reason, innovation and expression: all the inner, defiant ways in which people can be liberated.

Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles

The book begins with the unveiling of a collection of strange cracks in the structure of the Earth's atmosphere: windows that look to open into alternate realities. One such portal seems to be the point of the much debated botanical substance. The authority, with its leader at its helm, designates these portals as a threat to the institution's orthodoxy and endeavors to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from strict reason and return to instinct, however, her certainty that these sites must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they offer is mysteriously crucial – strengthens. "Dust, or the substance, or the imagination, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a Blakean conflict between naivety and experience is prepared.

Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth

At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the