Belated

Belated, now there's a descriptive word. Most particularly descriptive to me. For instance, over a week ago I finished Dune and promised to post a review of it the following day, but I didn't. Actually I forgot all about it. I have in fact read two books since I finished Dune. Lucky for you, I still remember it, which is more than I can say of some books that I've read more than once. It's called selective memory, and it's a curse.

So, Dune. Ever since I started reading science fiction, about two and a half years ago, I've been hearing about Dune. Authors sing Frank Herbert's praises, and dedicated sci-fi fans declare it's attributes from the internet's metaphorical mountaintops. So I went in expecting great things. It's always bad to have high expectations, I know, but I couldn't help it. If so many people love Dune, it's got to be good, right?

Well the answer to that question is no. I gave a little leeway in the beginning, thinking Mr. Herbert was just setting up the plot and the strangeness would die down after a while, but it never did. I was unsettled for the entire first half of the book and couldn't figure out why until I realised that the characters were like aliens - so little about them resembled human beings that there was no way to relate to anyone, and therefore no way to get into and enjoy the story. The problem with us humans is that we don't want to hear about non-humans and their emotions, because we simply can't understand them and don't care to try because it vexes us. even so, it might have been more involving if the characters weren't actually supposed to be humans.

Anyway, on to specifics. For the main character, we have Paul, who is a product of selective breeding, the Kwisatz Haderach, Muad'Dib, The Chosen One, etc., a fifteen-year-old boy who has been prepared for a life of leadership by his mother. His emotions and thought processes are so high, lofty, and intense that one can't help but be overwhelmed by Frank Herbert's astonishing and exhaustive use of adjectives in the descriptions of them. Mere humans are pawns, peasants, mindless parasites compared to him. He leads the Fremen, who are a race of people who live on a desert planet and survive with very little water, and we're led to believe that part of the process of him becoming such a great leader was his sudden procurement of the ability to see the future through a combination of willpower and drugs. Did I hear that right? Somehow, yes. In any case, because he can do whatever he wants, Paul has a son by the time he's sixteen. The son is killed a year later, and though I certainly looked hard for it, I found absolutely no grief from Paul for this son that he supposedly loved. Either he's got some serious seventeen-and-already-a-dad issues, or the last semblance of humanity just flew out his ear.

Wash, rinse, repeat with every single character, to some degree or other. It's hard to read a book where at least four of the main protagonists are complete Mary Sues.

But on to other things. One of the only reasons that I kept reading Dune is because of the amazing amount of worldbuilding that Herbert did. I always have looked at those sort of people in awe. You know, the ones who build three languages and six races and twenty religions and a caste system and geographical features and make sure all the rivers are in the right places in relation to the mountains. Frank Herbert is that sort of person. His description of Arrakis, the desert planet that most of the book takes place on, was really involved and interesting, as was the way he described the huge sandworms, and how the people made stillsuits to recycle bodily moisture so that they could survive on so little water. And the appendices! They were the most interesting of all. I found the one about terraforming especially interesting, because it seemed like Frank Herbert had done all the research and quite a bit of gardening himself in the making of it. He also talked about how the beginning of space travel had such a drastic effect on religion and how leaders all over the world coped with it. It was extremely engrossing.

In short, Dune began with a terrific premise and then was executed badly. It's a shame, really. I had an argument about it with Joseph already. He's a big fan.

-Amy