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A review by cephon
Dune by Frank Herbert
4.0
Probably the most begrudging 4 out of 5 I've ever given.
There's quite a bit I actually don't love about Dune, to be honest. While the amount of detail that goes into the world-building and lore is commendable, I found it rather monotonous and a chore to go through in how it's all presented. In fact, I've always personally found that extravagant lore building often exists at the expense of a compelling narrative or interesting characters, and in certain regards, I do believe the sentiment mostly stands in Dune as well. Very much of the book, scene by scene, consists of characters just standing and talking, and the characters themselves are honestly far from identifiable or personable. They don't speak in a way that distinguishes them from everyone else nor do they give anything away in terms of emotion, even in response to the few dramatic events that do transpire. They speak and think only of the immediate central conflict at hand and never anything else, leaving them feeling more like devices than people.
And yet, by the time I finished, I found myself almost scrambling to start up the next book already. Ultimately, it's a story I only started to appreciate once it was all over with, and I could look back at everything and see it all click into place. It's a story that takes its time and walks by its own beat, no matter how much I wanted it in the moment to go faster, with many layers to it. At once, it's a delicately crafted epic in the classical sense, but almost post-modern in execution, a story not of a hero against a villain, but of an evil and a lesser, unwilling evil. At another, it's a mythological tragedy -- one that even juxtaposes the "past" legends against the decayed present -- about the confines of fate and an inherited ambition. The characters' desires and ambitions belong to them as much as their bodies and minds do, and that is where one can find the implicit existential horror within all of the characters. The fate that they are destined to suffer from birth, and the fate they will suffer if they attempt to fight it.
In short, a book I respect more than I actually enjoyed, but hey, I guess it still counts for something.
There's quite a bit I actually don't love about Dune, to be honest. While the amount of detail that goes into the world-building and lore is commendable, I found it rather monotonous and a chore to go through in how it's all presented. In fact, I've always personally found that extravagant lore building often exists at the expense of a compelling narrative or interesting characters, and in certain regards, I do believe the sentiment mostly stands in Dune as well. Very much of the book, scene by scene, consists of characters just standing and talking, and the characters themselves are honestly far from identifiable or personable. They don't speak in a way that distinguishes them from everyone else nor do they give anything away in terms of emotion, even in response to the few dramatic events that do transpire. They speak and think only of the immediate central conflict at hand and never anything else, leaving them feeling more like devices than people.
And yet, by the time I finished, I found myself almost scrambling to start up the next book already. Ultimately, it's a story I only started to appreciate once it was all over with, and I could look back at everything and see it all click into place. It's a story that takes its time and walks by its own beat, no matter how much I wanted it in the moment to go faster, with many layers to it. At once, it's a delicately crafted epic in the classical sense, but almost post-modern in execution, a story not of a hero against a villain, but of an evil and a lesser, unwilling evil. At another, it's a mythological tragedy -- one that even juxtaposes the "past" legends against the decayed present -- about the confines of fate and an inherited ambition. The characters' desires and ambitions belong to them as much as their bodies and minds do, and that is where one can find the implicit existential horror within all of the characters. The fate that they are destined to suffer from birth, and the fate they will suffer if they attempt to fight it.
In short, a book I respect more than I actually enjoyed, but hey, I guess it still counts for something.