Things are falling apart in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a world that seems, in this volume especially, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from states, and pooling in the chambers of religious leaders, the vaults of business empires, the grasp of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says trader a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an city cafe. "Things we thought were firm and strong are weakening and collapsing."
Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that propels this final volume, which resumes where the previous book left off. This is, according to many, the author's last venture into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling world he first unveiled in the distant past, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose geography aligns with that of this world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans appear and reason and behave like us, but are joined by animal souls, beings in beast form; where the heavens are filled with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but below, buses are caught and beverages is sipped, and mature academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still recognisably the prickly and tenacious heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This circumscription is heightened by her split from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to leave in pursuit of that youthful part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an quality which he represents as her "vision"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and peril on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The church authority – the religious governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of strict, procedural malice – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's relative, who faults her for his sister's death – has positioned himself into the position of president of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his fresh authority to extend the religion's control. A key character, who rescued infant Lyra to safety along a flooded river as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is sent to a key location to discover more about Delamare's intentions. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly botanical extract which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a societal and financial upheaval rippling out from Central Asia. The substance is viewed by some as a commercial good, by different parties as a scientific or esoteric wonder, and by further factions – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of evil; an challenge that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like the first series, Lyra's deeds, and her future, are shown to be deeply entwined with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these plots ran mostly in side by side. In this final book, they converge. Like the original series, her choices and her path are unveiled to be inseparably woven with the fate of the universe. Her private mission to reconnect with her companion and regain her imagination becomes the central struggle in a larger conflict with an oppressive regime which, as these systems typically do, is attempting to stifle freedom of thought, creativity and art: all the inner, rebellious ways in which people can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The novel starts with the unveiling of a series of strange cracks in the fabric of the world's sky: portals that appear to lead to other worlds. One such opening appears to be the origin of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with Delamare at its leadership, classifies these openings as a problem to the institution's orthodoxy and sets out to destroy them. As the heroine begins to move from strict rationalism and back to instinct, however, her conviction that these locations must be preserved – that their meaning and what they offer is in some way essential – grows. "Dust, or the substance, or the vision, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a philosophical struggle between innocence and knowledge is set.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
