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Things are unraveling in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a universe that seems, now more than ever, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Organizations are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from authorities, and pooling in the offices of religious leaders, the treasuries of corporations, the control of crowds. "Something is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says merchant a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and strong are deteriorating and giving way."

Core Enigma and Her Quest

Just what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that propels the concluding book, which resumes where the previous book left off. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding venture into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting world he first revealed in the distant past, with the launch of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose terrain maps on to that of the real world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the people appear and think and act like us, but are accompanied by daemons, essences in creature form; where the skies are populated with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but underneath, transports are taken and drinks is drunk, and middle-aged academics carry Harrods shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the prickly and determined main character of the previous installments, but more mature, sadder, more cautious, less certain. This circumscription is heightened by her split 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 go off in pursuit of that youthful part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an quality which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which followed Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with amazement and danger on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the faith's controlling power, and the author's masterfully eerie representation of austere, administrative malice – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. The antagonist – Lyra's family member, who blames her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of leader of the church's High Council, and is intent on using his newfound power to broaden the institution's control. Malcolm Polstead, who saved infant Lyra to security along a overflowing river as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is sent to Geneva to discover more about Delamare's intentions. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and precious rose oil which manifests in some way to be the source of a social and financial upheaval spreading out from Central Asia. The extract is regarded by some as a tradeable good, by alternate groups as a scientific or spiritual wonder, and by yet others – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of darkness; an affront that must be eradicated. The question of its origins, its significance, and if it should be removed or protected is becoming urgent.

Like the first series, the heroine's deeds, and her fate, are shown to be deeply entwined with the destiny of the world

In its predecessor, these plots ran largely in tandem. In the conclusion, they merge. As in His Dark Materials, her choices and her path are unveiled to be deeply entwined with the destiny of the world. Her private mission to reconnect with her soul and rediscover her imagination becomes the central struggle in a wider conflict with an authoritarian regime which, as such regimes often attempt, is attempting to quell independence of thinking, innovation and expression: all the personal, resistant ways in which individuals can be liberated.

Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles

The novel begins with the unveiling of a collection of curious openings in the structure of the Earth's sky: portals that seem to open into other worlds. A particular opening seems to be the point of the much debated rose oil. The authority, with the antagonist at its leadership, labels these portals as a problem to the church's orthodoxy and sets out to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict rationalism and return to instinct, yet, her belief that these sites must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they offer is in some way crucial – grows. "Dust, or the extract, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a philosophical conflict between innocence and knowledge is established.

Plot Rhythm and Character Development

At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the