Dune Review

Just finished Frank Herbert's Dune and Dune Messiah, as well as a prequel to the series called The Butlerian Jihad, co-written by Herbert's son Brian and Kevin J. Anderson.

Dune was excellent. Herbert did a wonderful job establishing an epic story. The book is set in an enormously well-conceived and elaborate universe, a rarity for sci-fi books. It also displays surprising strengths, including well-written characters and a fascinating plot.

Messiah was disappointing. Mostly a collection of half-baked philosophical diatribes, the characters who were so engaging in the first book were flat and incomprehensible in this one. The book also suffers from a frustrating lack of plot, with a conspiracy among incomprehensible characters that isn't explained or developed. More than anything else, the book is plagued by overuse of surprising, exciting, innovative elements from Dune that make them dense and commonplace in Messiah. I feel something of an obligation to read the rest of this series which is so legendary in the science fiction world, but after reading Messiah I'm not sure I want to.

The Butlerian Jihad, unsurprisingly, is substantially different from Herbert's works. Disappointingly, they're far less literary in style than Dune, and they feel like many other modern sci-fi stories (Incidentally, the only other book of Anderson's which I've read, the Star Wars novel Darksaber, is among the worst books I've ever read.) This makes it a quick read, but an interesting one nonetheless. Particularly interesting is the story of a sentient robot trying to figure out what makes humans human, and emulate it. It's worth a quick read, particularly if you've read Dune and want to know more about the foundations of many of the facets of its universe.

Back to my regularly scheduled reading...