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apersonfromflorida's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Graphic: Death and War
Moderate: Child death and Death of parent
Minor: Blood, Misogyny, and Racism
samdalefox's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
For such a famous and epic book there are plenty of detailed reviews for you to peruse. I'll only highlight the themes I identified and top line likes and dislikes about the book.
Themes
- Commentary on ecology and Earth's environmental crises
- Investigation into different sorts of power e.g. resource control (spice production, a clear metaphor to oil in the Middle East), 'soft' political control (bene gesserit and other religious sects), 'hard' militarised imperial political control (classism with the Landsraad, Emperor, salusa secundus, and racism against the Freman).
- Eugenics lack of morality e.g. the bene gesserit breeding program, and 'race conciousness'. I can see why the fascists love it so much. I read the book as criticising rather than advocating this point though.
- Beware of 'heroes'/'Messiahs/Leaders - Keynes's last words were explicitly that Dune did not need Paul the Hero. The Freman would have been better liberating themselves on their own terms with their own ecology and power plan.
- Investigation into the powers of the mind, mental capacities, and different ways of seeing. Perhaps influenced/inspired by 60s psychodelic drugs?
Likes
- I enjoyed this as an opposition to Assimov's Foundation series where everything is determined by computers and tehcnology and statistics etc. Dune felt like the mirror image demonstrated in the powers of the mentat and the butlerian jihad.
- Finally, women power! The bene gesserit. The Fremen women. Even Princess Irulan to a degree. Ok, they're not morally 'good' and don't have a lot of power, but women, with some agency, in a book from the 60s!
- The whole world building was beautiful and swept me up. Though detailed, long, and written a long time ago, I found it very easy to read.
- The three appendices: ecology of Dune, religion of Dune, Bene Gesserit motives and purposes.
Dislikes
- Alia. Just weird. I suppose that's the point of her, but, just nope.
- I find it difficult to believe that the missionaria protectivia planted the religious seed of The Prophet. Although reasonable (and possibly a shrewd criticism of religion in general), I get the niggly sense that this may have some unconcious bias or tinged racism to it. The fact that an entire people (brown, Islamic inspired people) so easily adopted this narrative of an outsider arriving to be their saviour... just I don't know, it was the only thing I thought hmmm really, sounds a bit off? I'd like to read reviews from Middle Eastern people to hear their opinions about whether Dune is racist or not.
- Outdated homophobia painting Baron Harkonnen as a depraved homosexual. The film made a good call in updating this aspect. On this point, the film adapted the book brilliantly. It was largely true to the source material and anything it left out or embellished was to enhance the core story and update the text beyond homophobia, sexism, racism etc. So, bravo! I look forward to watching part II at the cinema when it's released.
Moderate: Death, Drug use, Fatphobia, and Colonisation
Minor: Child death, Grief, Murder, Pregnancy, War, Blood, Violence, Addiction, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual harassment, and Slavery
readingrainbowroad's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Moderate: Violence, Death, and Blood
Minor: Rape, Pregnancy, War, and Child death
yorgosson's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Graphic: Death of parent, Child death, Blood, Death, War, Rape, and Violence
Moderate: Fatphobia and Addiction
Minor: Child abuse
dontforgetthelights's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
Moderate: Pregnancy, Violence, Drug use, Grief, Addiction, Blood, Death of parent, Death, and Slavery
Minor: Rape and Child death
ivana's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Diverse cast of characters? No
3.0
Graphic: Addiction, Blood, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Drug use, Violence, Genocide, and Murder
Minor: Child abuse, Pedophilia, Adult/minor relationship, and Rape
b0ygenius's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
after spending a literal month reading this book i am finally done. oh my god.
book 1? show stopping jaw dropping i was gagged the whole time omfg. THE END?????? no like i was screaming. it was so intense from start to finish. and tbh that is all bc of my man duke leto atreides omfg. i was rooting for him from the start simply because he is played by THE oscar isaac in the 2021 movie and tbh i think he was my favorite character. like he came he saw he SERVED!!!!!!! this part was sooo good based on this i thought dune would become one of my all time favorites but unfortunately. this was most definitely the peak of this book and tbh i was thinking of giving this like a 3.5/5 but i loved book 1 so much that i can’t give it anything lower than a 4
book 2 tho…. omfg. soooooo sloooowwww i literally spent like a week reading book 1 and a week reading book 3 and then book 2 took me two weeks bc it was just so BORING omfg the first like 150 pages were just [redacted] and [redacted] wandering around the desert and it was boring. and one of my main problems with this book is that some things weren’t explored as thoroughly as they should’ve been like some side characters were given such a large role in the beginning of the book and then had 0 appearance for literally 400 pages only to appear at the end of the book briefly again. and some characters had such unsatisfying deaths especially the ones at the end like it just felt like we never got a satisfying ending to the arcs of a lot of the characters who died.
book 3 was also kinda boring the end was alright but again i thought it was so unsatisfactory. like we spent, not even an exaggeration, like 350 pages building up to this so you would think it would be some grand dramatic end but it rlly wasn’t. go girl give us nothing. paul at the end was cool tho he was rlly badass and kinda hot tbh 😦 i was so conflicted abt him for a lot of the book i kept flipping back and forth between liking him and not liking him but in the end i think he had a really great arc and his development was done pretty well but his like prescient awareness or whatever stuff was kinda hard to follow. and it was hard to follow his the development of his abilities.. like it was hard to tell just how powerful he was he would do things or have some vision or whatever and i would be like “damn since when can he do that???????” maybe that was on purpose but either way i did not like it. paul was kinda giving me whiplash but whatever
i can definitely see why this book is considered one of the greatest sci fi books of all time and i could see how this influenced later sci fi stuff like star wars and i definitely do not regret reading this but this definitely isn’t for everyone bc it is very very long and it can be hard to follow at times and there is a Looot of world building (but tbh i didn’t mind the amount of world building as much as i thought i would, i rlly liked how intricate and immersive and thought out the world is). i personally did not find it that hard to read and i think that’s because i learned some of the basic background info abt the characters/the world/the politics/etc before i started reading. like the house system, the main characters, the spacing guild, bene gesserits, the butlerian jihad, etc etc and i think that really helped me so if you want to read dune i would recommend looking at some beginner’s guides there are plenty online
Graphic: Murder, Addiction, Blood, Child death, Colonisation, Death, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Drug use, and War
Moderate: Body shaming and Fatphobia
daniel_b17's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
The start of the book really focuses on the world building, and establishing characters. Two aspects I think that Frank Herbert knocked out of the park. The fact that we are dropped into this world that at first seems incredibly difficult to understand and very intricate, and as we progress, we come to understand the subtle terms and nuances along with the people/races and the whole political/imperial system and it's workings. 5/5 on the world building aspect of Dune.
The one thing that I found very difficult to understand was the way Frank Herbert writes. I found that it was very difficult to understand at first. I often found myself re-reading certain paragraphs and/or sentences, because I didn't understand something. Throughout the book however, you come to understand his writing and the flow of how he gets his point across if that makes sense. He has a, what I would call, very olden times type of writing style, which as I said before can be difficult for some.
Overall I though that it was a very well written book, however I found that Frank Herbert's storytelling ability was very choppy and not something that I would be drawn to, had it not been for the hype of the movie releasing. That's where, for me, he lost a few marks. In the future I hope to read the rest of the series, as I have heard good things about them as well. My review is purely opinion based, and by no means is meant as a shot toward the community that reveres Frank Herbert. I say yet again, I have no hate toward Frank Herbert or the people that like his books.
Recommended for people who are at ease with slower paced books, focused more on political intrigue and the inner workings of an empire and betrayal, rather than the more modern Fantasy/Sci-Fi books that focus more on battles and action.
3.75/5
Graphic: Blood, Death, Death of parent, Drug use, Grief, and Pregnancy
Moderate: Child death, War, and Pregnancy
Minor: Rape and Sexual assault
zosia_q's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Graphic: Death and War
Minor: Blood, Violence, and Religious bigotry
claudiamacpherson's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Graphic: Blood, Colonisation, Murder, Violence, War, and Xenophobia
Moderate: Body horror, Death, Death of parent, Drug use, Misogyny, Racism, Sexism, and Slavery
Minor: Addiction, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body shaming, Child abuse, Child death, Fire/Fire injury, Homophobia, Kidnapping, Pregnancy, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Torture