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Tings are collapsing in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that appears, now more than ever, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reorganizing themselves along new and troubling lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from governments, and gathering in the chambers of religious leaders, the treasuries of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and durable are faltering and collapsing."

Core Enigma and Her Quest

Exactly what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that animates the concluding book, which continues where its predecessor left off. This is, according to many, the author's concluding 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 realm whose terrain maps on to that of this world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans look and think and act like us, but are accompanied by daemons, essences in creature form; where the air are filled with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, transports are caught and drinks is sipped, and middle-aged academics carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in the prequel, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a young woman: still distinctly the sharp and persistent main character of the earlier books, but more mature, sadder, more careful, less certain. This restraint is intensified by her split from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.

Interwoven Plots

Pan's decision to leave in quest of that youthful part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque trek across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the religious governing authority, and the author's brilliantly sinister incarnation of austere, bureaucratic wickedness – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of leader of the authority's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his fresh authority to expand the religion's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued baby the heroine to safety along a swollen river as an young boy in the first book, is now an university scholar with a sideline in intelligence work: he is assigned to the city to discover more about his aims. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the rare and precious essential oil which seems in some way to be the source of a societal and financial disturbance emanating out from that area. The substance is seen by some as a commercial good, by others as a scientific or esoteric miracle, and by yet others – the extremist "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of evil; an insult that must be obliterated. The issue of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be eliminated or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.

Like the first series, our protagonist's decisions, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be deeply connected with the destiny of the realm

In The Secret Commonwealth, these narratives ran broadly in tandem. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to the first trilogy, Lyra's actions and her destiny are unveiled to be deeply linked with the destiny of the universe. Her personal journey to reconnect with her companion and rediscover her creativity becomes the key conflict in a wider war with an authoritarian system which, as such regimes always have, is attempting to suppress independence of thinking, creativity and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which humans can be free.

Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles

The novel opens with the unveiling of a series of strange openings in the fabric of the Earth's atmosphere: portals that appear to lead to different dimensions. An example of a portal seems to be the source of the much debated mystical extract. The authority, with the antagonist at its head, designates these windows as a challenge to the institution's orthodoxy and endeavors to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to move from strict reason and revert to intuition, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be defended – that their meaning and what they offer is somehow crucial – strengthens. "Dust, or rose oil, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a Blakean struggle between purity and maturity is set.

Story Tempo and Character Development

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