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Tings are collapsing in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a realm that manifests, now more than ever, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or restructuring themselves along novel and troubling lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from governments, and gathering in the offices of religious leaders, the vaults of business empires, the control of crowds. "Something is at work, stealthily, gradually", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his post in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and durable are weakening and collapsing."

The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey

Precisely what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that drives this final volume, which resumes where the previous book concluded. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's concluding foray into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating universe he first revealed in the distant past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of our world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals appear and reason and act like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, essences in beast form; where the heavens are teeming with witches and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, buses are taken and tea is consumed, and middle-aged scholars carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a child in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began the series, is now a mature individual: still clearly the sharp and tenacious protagonist of the previous installments, but older, melancholic, more cautious, less sure. This circumscription is intensified by her division from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.

Merging Narratives

The daemon's resolve to depart in search of that youthful part of her which she may have forgotten (an trait which he represents as her "vision"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which followed the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and peril on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in play, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the religious governing authority, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of rigid, bureaucratic malice – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the position of leader of the authority's ruling assembly, and is set on using his recently acquired influence to expand the church's rule. Another protagonist, who rescued young Lyra to security along a swollen river as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in intelligence work: he is sent to Geneva to discover more about his intentions. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and valuable essential oil which seems mysteriously to be the origin of a social and economic disturbance spreading out from the region. The extract is seen by certain groups as a tradeable good, by others as a scientific or esoteric miracle, and by further factions – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a source of malevolence; an affront that must be obliterated. The issue of its source, its significance, and if it should be removed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.

Similar to the original trilogy, Lyra's decisions, and her future, are revealed to be deeply connected with the future of the universe

In its predecessor, these narratives ran mostly in tandem. In the conclusion, they come together. As in the original series, the protagonist's actions and her destiny are unveiled to be inseparably entwined with the future of the realm. Her personal quest to rejoin with her soul and rediscover her imagination becomes the primary battleground in a wider conflict with an controlling regime which, as such authorities typically do, is attempting to stifle independence of thought, innovation and culture: all the personal, rebellious ways in which individuals can be liberated.

Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts

The novel starts with the unveiling of a collection of curious openings in the structure of the planet's atmosphere: gateways that look to give on to alternate realities. A particular window appears to be the source of the much debated botanical substance. The church, with its leader at its leadership, designates these openings as a problem to the church's beliefs and sets out to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to move from rigid rationalism and revert to intuition, yet, her certainty that these locations must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they offer is in some way crucial – increases. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a philosophical tussle between naivety and knowledge is set.

Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth

At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the