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Things are falling apart in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that appears, in this volume especially, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Organizations are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along new and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from governments, and accumulating in the chambers of religious leaders, the coffers of business empires, the grasp of rioters. "Some force is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his post in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and solid are deteriorating and collapsing."

The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey

Exactly what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the question that propels the concluding book, which resumes where The Secret Commonwealth concluded. This is, by all accounts, the author's final excursion into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling realm he first unveiled in the distant past, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose landscape maps on to that of the real world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the people appear and reason and act like us, but are joined by animal souls, essences in beast form; where the heavens are filled with sorceresses and gryphons, but below, transports are taken and tea is sipped, and mature professors carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the original 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 prickly and determined protagonist of the previous installments, but more mature, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is intensified by her separation from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.

Interwoven Plots

Pan's decision to go off in pursuit of that innocent part of her which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "imagination"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a adventurous voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and risk on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the religious controlling power, and the author's deliciously chilling embodiment of rigid, procedural wickedness – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's family member, who faults her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the position of head of the Magisterium's governing body, and is intent on using his fresh authority to broaden the church's rule. Another protagonist, who saved infant the heroine to safety along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the first book, is now an academic with a sideline in intelligence work: he is assigned to a key location to discover more about Delamare's aims. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly essential oil which manifests mysteriously to be the origin of a societal and financial crisis spreading out from the region. The substance is viewed by certain groups as a commercial good, by others as a research-based or spiritual wonder, and by further factions – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a origin of darkness; an insult that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its origins, its meaning, and if it should be destroyed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.

Like the first series, the heroine's deeds, and her future, are shown to be inextricably linked with the fate of the world

In The Secret Commonwealth, these storylines ran mostly in tandem. In the conclusion, they come together. As in the original series, Lyra's actions and her destiny are shown to be inseparably entwined with the fate of the world. Her personal journey to rejoin with her soul and regain her vision becomes the central battleground in a wider battle with an authoritarian regime which, as such regimes always have, is striving to quell independence of reason, originality and art: all the internal, defiant ways in which humans can be free.

Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles

The story starts with the discovery of a series of curious openings in the makeup of the planet's sky: portals that appear to give on to different dimensions. One such portal manifests to be the source of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with the antagonist at its leadership, classifies these windows as a threat to the religion's beliefs and aims to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict reason and back to feeling, yet, her belief that these sites must be defended – that their significance and their value is in some way vital – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or the extract, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or whatever we name it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a Blakean tussle between innocence and maturity is prepared.

Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth

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