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Things are unraveling in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a world that manifests, now more than ever, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or restructuring themselves along new and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from governments, and gathering in the halls of religious leaders, the vaults of conglomerates, the grasp of rioters. "Something is at work, very quietly, gradually", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are faltering and collapsing."

The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path

Exactly what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the question that drives this final volume, which continues where the previous book ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's final excursion into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling realm he first revealed in the distant past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose landscape maps on to that of our world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals look and think and act like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, beings in creature form; where the air are populated with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but below, transports are ridden and beverages is consumed, and middle-aged academics carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still clearly the spiky and persistent heroine of the previous installments, but more mature, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This circumscription is heightened by her separation from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.

Merging Narratives

The daemon's resolve to go off in pursuit of that youthful part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an quality which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw Lyra undertake a wandering trek across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with amazement and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in play, and sinister powers at work. The church authority – the church's controlling power, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of rigid, administrative malice – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's family member, who blames her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the office of president of the authority's governing body, and is set on using his recently acquired influence to expand the institution's dominium. Another protagonist, who rescued baby the heroine to safety along a overflowing Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a sideline in espionage: he is assigned to Geneva to discover more about the antagonist's plans. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and valuable rose oil which appears somehow to be the cause of a social and economic crisis emanating out from Central Asia. The extract is viewed by various factions as a commercial product, by different parties as a research-based or esoteric wonder, and by yet others – the zealous "highland figures" – as a source of malevolence; an insult that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its source, what it stands for, and if it should be eliminated or safeguarded is escalating in importance.

As in the original trilogy, the heroine's actions, and her destiny, are shown to be deeply linked with the future of the universe

In its predecessor, these narratives ran broadly in side by side. In the conclusion, they come together. As in His Dark Materials, her actions and her destiny are unveiled to be deeply woven with the fate of the world. Her personal journey to reunite with her soul and rediscover her imagination becomes the central struggle in a larger conflict with an oppressive government which, as such regimes always have, is seeking to quell autonomy of reason, creativity and expression: all the internal, rebellious ways in which humans can be free.

Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts

The book starts with the unveiling of a set of curious fissures in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: portals that seem to give on to other worlds. An example of a window seems to be the origin of the much debated mystical extract. The church, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these portals as a problem to the religion's beliefs and sets out to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to turn away from rigid reason and back to feeling, yet, her certainty that these locations must be protected – that their meaning and their value is in some way crucial – increases. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a poetic conflict between innocence and experience is set.

Plot Rhythm and Character Development

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