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Title:
Dune
Series: Dune Chronicles #1
Author:
Frank Herbert
Rating: 5 of 5 Stars
Genre:
SF
Pages: 604
Words:
206K
Publish: 1965
Technically,
this is the Deluxe Edition released in 2019. I did a “Book
Catch” post when I received it for Christmas the year after it
was released. The reasons it is “deluxe” is because it has new
(delicious!) cover art, some maps and stuff and then some blatherings
by Herbert’s son Brian. Brian has blathered on in other previous
editions of Dune, mainly because he’s not man enough to
write something successful like Dune so he’s getting by on
daddy’s coat tails. In the older editions, Brian did an
“Afterwards” where he self-promoted the new Dune stuff he and
that no-good lousy pathetic Kevin J Anderson co-wrote along with
teasing about Dune 7, the mythical book Frank was going to write to
finish up the Dune Chronicles, but died before that happened.
Baby Herbert and KJ(ack)A(ss) wrote Hunters
of Dune and Sandworms
of Dune and both sucked donkieballz. I compared this “new”
Forward to that older Afterwards and the only difference is that Baby
Herbert adds a paragraph talking about the upcoming new Dune movies
(Dune:
Part I and Dune:
Part II) as well as various games coming (Dune
Imperium I believe, which Spalanz has talked about extensively)
out soon. What a fething loser, can’t even write a new Foreward,
how pathetic is that?
And enough of that! Onward to the good stuff.
This is my fourth “Official” read through of Dune. Down at the end of the review, under my avatar, you’ll see links to the previous three reviews. However, like many of my favorite books here on my blog, I read and re-read this book many times before I started recording my reviews. I think I was 14 or 15 when I first read Dune. I saw a paperback at the library and it had the atrocious movie cover of the 1984 movie, but to teenager me, it looked awesome (and while I abominate that movie as a “Dune” movie, I like it well enough on its own) and when I read it, the scope just blew me away. Then when I was a bit older I found out the library had the rest of the Dune Chronicles in hardcover and I devoured them, even while not necessarily understanding all that was going on. But based on my reading habits as a teen, I suspect I read Dune three times between 1993 and 2000, which is when I began recording when I read books. So this is probably my 7th time reading it, possibly my 8th and I still love it and think it is a complete and utter 5star book. It doesn’t get much better than this.
This is not an action book. There is the fight scene between Paul and Jamis when Paul and his mother are escaping to the desert and the dubious safety of the Fremen, but it is no more than a couple of paragraphs. There is also the fight scene near the end of the book between Paul and his cousin Feyd-Rautha Harkonnon but once again, only a couple of paragraphs long. Any of the battle scenes between the Fremen and smugglers or the Sardakaur are only given the broad brushstroke treatment. If you read much of Herbert, you will come to discover that he doesn’t like action scenes. He prefers things to happen off page and then just state that they happened. That proclivity isn’t as apparent here, but the roots of that mindset are shown for those who are looking. I’ve noted that before, but I think it bears proclaiming because of how the damnable new movies show the stories. There is lots of action shown in those that are simply glossed over in the book. Dune is not a simple adventure story.
I hesitate to say the following, and I’ll explain why after. Dune is a thinking man’s story. I don’t like saying that because it smacks of literary snobbery and the kind of people who think absolute garbage writing is the best. I despise literary types, who wouldn’t know a good story if it grabbed them by the throat and choked them to death. To them, the story is the least important part of a book. A “good” book is one that either preaches what they are preaching, or is one that they can shoehorn in their own despicable baby killing world view and try to destroy everything good and decent. They are the kind of people who read a book and then try to tell everyone “what it really means” no matter what is patently obvious or even stated by the author himself. They are the militant vegetarians of the book world. But vegetarians have some very good points to make when it comes to health and it would behoove most Americans to listen to them more. And thus it is with Frank Herbert and Dune. The story is a good story AND Herbert brings up many different aspects of humanity and sets forth his thoughts on the issues. It’s not that he’s baldly pontificating and denigrating everyone who disagrees with him, but he’s putting forth ideas and letting the reader decide how deep they want to follow that rabbit trail he has exposed to their view. Herbert won’t be put into just one box.
He doesn’t do this through just one avenue of thought, but through a multiplicity of story ideas. You have the government of the Landsraad and the Imperial House. You have the Bene Gesserit and their breeding program for the next step of human evolution. You have the Fremen and the Sardakaur as objects of war, both secular and religious. You have prophetic visions on one hand and manipulations of the space/time continuum on the other in the Spacing Guild. Paul himself brings most of these ideas into himself and we are given little hints that he is cogitating some very deep things, things which Herbert doesn’t write about in this book.
Each time I read Dune I have to decide if I’ll continue the Chronicles or treat it as a standalone. It really changes how you view this book depending on which option you go with. When I last read this in 2017, I stated that I wanted to read Dune as a standalone from then on. I can understand why I wrote that. It is very hard to start reading the Chronicles and not finish, as the story keeps pulling you deeper and deeper into the mythos. The problem is that it leads you into the horrendous finale by Frank’s son (the aforementioned Dune 7 duology linked in the first paragraph above) and nothing is worth that, absolutely nothing. Now, Frank did write a trilogy for Dune. Dune, Dune Messiah and then Children of Dune. God Emperor of Dune is a pivot point in the series and heads the reader off into a much broader scope of a story, for good or ill is up to you to decide. This time around I’m thinking I’ll read the trilogy, as I’ve never done that before.
This book is over 600 pages, but that is because there is a glossary and several appendixes. I HIGHLY recommend reading those and not skipping them. In fact, you might want to keep your finger in the glossary section so you can look up terms, names and places when you come across them in the story and don’t understand them. Do be aware, if you do that, there will be spoilers. Reading these is a good refresher course for any Dune lover and whether this is your first time or your eighth, you can’t go wrong with reading the them.
Finally, the cover to the Deluxe Edition. I love it, period. I can already tell this is going to be the cover love choice for December. It is as inevitable as Paul Muad’dib’s jihad ;-)
★★★★★
From Wikipedia
Duke Leto Atreides of House Atreides, ruler of the ocean world Caladan, is assigned by the Padishah Emperor Shaddam IV to serve as fief ruler of the planet Arrakis. Although Arrakis is a harsh and inhospitable desert planet, it is of enormous importance because it is the only planetary source of melange, or the "spice", a unique and incredibly valuable substance that extends human youth, vitality and lifespan. It is also through the consumption of spice that Spacing Guild Navigators are able to effect safe interstellar travel through a limited ability to see into the future. The Emperor is jealous of the Duke's rising popularity in the Landsraad, the council of Great Houses, and sees House Atreides as a potential rival and threat. He conspires with House Harkonnen, the former stewards of Arrakis and the longstanding enemies of the Atreides, to destroy Leto and his family after their arrival. Leto is aware his assignment is a trap of some kind, but is compelled to obey the Emperor's orders anyway.
Leto's concubine Lady Jessica is an acolyte of the Bene Gesserit, an exclusively female group that pursues mysterious political aims and wields seemingly superhuman physical and mental abilities, such as the ability to control their bodies down to the cellular level, and also decide the sex of their children. Though Jessica was instructed by the Bene Gesserit to bear a daughter as part of their breeding program, out of love for Leto she bore him a son, Paul. From a young age, Paul is trained in warfare by Leto's aides, the elite soldiers Duncan Idaho and Gurney Halleck. Thufir Hawat, the Duke's Mentat (human computers, able to store vast amounts of data and perform advanced calculations on demand), has instructed Paul in the ways of political intrigue. Jessica has also trained her son in Bene Gesserit disciplines.
Paul's prophetic dreams interest Jessica's superior, the Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam. She subjects Paul to a deadly test. She holds a poisoned needle, the gom jabbar, to his neck, ready to strike should he withdraw his hand from a box which creates extreme pain by nerve induction but causes no physical damage. This is to test Paul's ability to endure the pain and override his animal instincts, proving that he is, in Bene Gesserit eyes, human. Paul passes, enduring greater pain than any woman has ever been subjected to in the test.
Paul and his parents travel with their household to occupy Arrakeen, the capital on Arrakis. Leto learns of the dangers involved in harvesting the spice, which is protected by giant sandworms, and seeks to negotiate with the planet's indigenous Fremen people, seeing them as a valuable ally rather than foes. Soon after the Atreides' arrival, Harkonnen forces attack, joined by the Emperor's ferocious Sardaukar troops in disguise. Leto is betrayed by his personal physician, the Suk doctor Wellington Yueh, who delivers a drugged Leto to the Baron Vladimir Harkonnen and his twisted Mentat, Piter De Vries.
Yueh, who delivered Leto under duress, arranges for Jessica and Paul to escape into the desert. Duncan is killed helping them flee, and they are subsequently presumed dead in a sandstorm by the Harkonnens. Yueh replaces one of Leto's teeth with a poison gas capsule, hoping Leto can kill Baron Harkonnen during their encounter. Piter kills Yueh, and the Baron narrowly avoids the gas (due to his defensive shield), which kills Leto, Piter, and the others in the room. The Baron forces Thufir to take over Piter's position by dosing him with a long-lasting, fatal poison and threatening to withhold the regular antidote doses. While he follows the Baron's orders, Thufir works secretly to undermine the Harkonnens.
Having fled into the desert, Paul is exposed to high concentrations of spice and has visions through which he realizes he has significant powers (as a result of the Bene Gesserit breeding scheme). He foresees potential futures in which he lives among the Fremen before leading them on a holy war across the known universe. Paul reveals that Jessica's father is Baron Harkonnen, a secret kept from her by the Bene Gesserit.
Paul and Jessica traverse the desert in search of Fremen people. After being captured by a Fremen band, Paul and Jessica agree to teach the Fremen the Bene Gesserit fighting technique known to the Fremen as the "weirding way" and are accepted into the community of Sietch Tabr. Paul proves his manhood by killing a Fremen man named Jamis in a ritualistic crysknife fight and chooses the Fremen name Muad'Dib, while Jessica opts to undergo a ritual to become a Reverend Mother by drinking and neutralizing the poisonous Water of Life. Pregnant with Leto's daughter, she inadvertently causes her unborn daughter Alia to become infused with the same powers in the womb. Paul takes a Fremen lover, Chani, who bears him a son he names Leto.
Two years pass, and Paul's powerful prescience manifests, which confirms to the Fremen that he is their prophesied "Lisan al-Gaib" messiah, a legend planted by the Bene Gesserit's Missionaria Protectiva. Paul embraces his father's belief that the Fremen could be a powerful fighting force to take back Arrakis, but also sees that if he does not control them, their jihad could consume the entire universe. Word of the new Fremen leader reaches both the Baron and the Emperor as spice production falls due to their increasingly destructive raids. The Baron encourages his brutish nephew Glossu "Beast" Rabban to rule with an iron fist, hoping the contrast with his shrewder nephew Feyd-Rautha will make the latter popular among the people of Arrakis when he eventually replaces Rabban. The Emperor, suspecting the Baron of trying to create troops more powerful than the Sardaukar to seize power, sends spies to Arrakis. Thufir uses the opportunity to sow seeds of doubt in the Baron about the Emperor's true plans, putting further strain on their alliance.
Gurney, who survived the Harkonnen coup and became a smuggler, reunites with Paul and Jessica after a Fremen raid on his harvester. Believing Jessica to be a traitor, Gurney threatens to kill her but is stopped by Paul. Paul did not foresee Gurney's attack and concludes he must increase his prescience by drinking the Water of Life, which is fatal to males. Paul falls into unconsciousness for three weeks after drinking the poison, but when he wakes, he has clairvoyance across time and space: he is the Kwisatz Haderach, the ultimate goal of the Bene Gesserit breeding program.
Paul senses the Emperor and the Baron are amassing fleets around Arrakis to quell the Fremen rebellion, and prepares the Fremen for a major offensive. The Emperor arrives with the Baron on Arrakis. The Sardaukar seize a Fremen outpost, killing many, including young Leto, while Alia is captured and taken to the Emperor. Under cover of an electric storm, which shorts out the Sardaukar's defensive shields, Paul and the Fremen, riding giant sandworms, destroy the capital's natural rock fortifications with atomics and attack, while Alia assassinates the Baron and escapes. The Fremen quickly defeat both the Harkonnen and Sardaukar troops, killing Rabban in the process. Thufir is ordered to assassinate Paul, who gives him the opportunity to take anything that Thufir wishes of him. Thufir chooses to stab himself with the poisoned needle intended for Paul.
Paul faces the Emperor, threatening to destroy spice production forever unless Shaddam abdicates the throne. Feyd-Rautha challenges Paul to a knife fight, during which he cheats and tries to kill Paul with a poison spur in his belt. Paul gains the upper hand and kills him. The Emperor reluctantly cedes the throne to Paul and promises his daughter Princess Irulan's hand in marriage. Paul takes control of the Empire, but realizes that he cannot stop the Fremen jihad, as their belief in him is too powerful to restrain.
