Paul of Dune

These books have been and always will be a travesty. No one, especially the author's son, has the right to play around with the works of Frank Herbert. What he created was a living, breathing fictional universe, filled with characters of depth and substance. The story itself also wasn't half bad!

What his son has done, along with that "Star Wars book writer" (that should pretty much say it all), is nothing other than pissing on Frank's grave. I am sure it must give one a little bit of joy to once again be "in" the Dune universe, but we all know these books are a cheap facsimile of the originals.

Be brave, peoples, and don't give these defilers any more silver pieces.

This is definitely the worst book in the Dune series. It is not awful, it just is not good, or great. In fact, it smacks of being written to earn as much money for the writers as possible. Originally, it was not available on Kindle, now it is for over $16. I thought Kindle topped out at $9.99. I loved the Butlerian Jihad books (couldn't put them down until I was done) and thought the House books by these writers were also excellent. In addition, while the first half of Sandworms dragged, the second half was excellent and nicely tied the Dune story up. Where to start. First, I really enjoy the short verses/statements at the beginning of each chapter. Frank Herbert wrote very thoughtful lines. Here, it appears that the authors wrote them at the last minute as none were noteworthy and most came off amateurish. Second, the story is ok, but the actions of some of the characters are just not believable. Not to give anything away, but one Ginaz swordmaster does things that make little sense and in reality, I thought, came off stupid. In addition, there is little to no depth in the characters and many questions remain unanswered. Overall, if you are a Dune fan, you should read this book, but wait for the paperback, the hardcover is not worth the money. I understand that the writers are preparing more "character" books. In the future, I will wait for the paperback version. In the end, I hope they take their writing responsibility for this great series much more seriously as they prepare future books. It would be a shame if this became just another mediocre scifi series.

As every Dune fan knows, there was a lapse of a few decades between Dune and Dune Messiah, the latter having picked up after Paul's Jihad campaigns. This is the story being told here. It oscillates between Paul fighting his Jihad after he replaces the Leader of the known universe and Paul as a young man/boy. It also focuses on the origin of the Harkonen and Atreides rivalry, which originated in House Moritani.

"Jihad" Paul shows the great length's Paul's enemies go to when numerous assassination attempts are made on him and his family members after all the carnage his Jihad has wrought. Any planet or people that did not fall into line and accept him as the leader of the known universe had war made upon them by Paul's military forces. Since many resisted his leadership, billions of people were killed and hundreds of planets were destroyed, all in the name of Jihad. This results in numerous assassination attempts on Paul and his family, as many see him as an abomination. Paul suffers quite badly.

The other story being told here focuses on young Paul, with Gurney Halleck, Duncan Idaho, and his father at his side. When the leader of House Moritani loses his son, he retaliates in kind. This causes war between the great houses. House Harkonen secretly dresses their military in House Moritani uniforms and dispatches them to aid Moritani, who are vastly outnumbered and outgunned. Moritani has a brilliant plan to lure enemy forces into an area and then blow up the ground beneath their feet, as it used to be mines. He nearly succeeds until Rabban Harkonen disobeys orders and sends his forces into the area of hollowed ground, and loses them. All in all, not a bad story as it chronicles the many difficulties Paul faced as a religious and political leader. I would score this novel an 87% and say its worth reading and the price of admission, especially if you love the Dune novels as I do.

This story begins "One Year After the Fall of Shaddam IV" and continues through the next four years, with substantial flashbacks into a time in Paul's life, age 12, during his first hands-on experience with war. Though it's been years since I've read Frank Herbert's sequels to his masterpiece DUNE, this volume seems to mesh fairly well with what came before with only minor inconsistencies from the original.

In PAUL OF DUNE, the reader is carried through Paul's out-of-control Jihad, which his prescience tells him is imperative for the continuation of the human race. The point-of-view is third-person, with Paul holding about 50% of the chapters, switching back and forth with other personages such as: Stilgar, Gurney Halleck, Shaddam Corrino, Count Hasimir Fenring, the "flamboyant Swordmaster" Bludd from Ecaz, Vladimir Harkonnen, Princess Irulan, and others. Paul is trying to consolidate his power in a galaxy where politics are ever in flux and assassination attempts are the order of the day. Even when he was young, and the Assassin's War was in full throttle, the worlds were not at peace. Authors Brian & Kevin do a good job keeping the reader grounded in character and action. For a reader interested in this story, it does not get boring.

I found the focus of this volume almost as pointed toward Irulan as toward Paul. Here, she is blameless of any offence against Chani, which I found an irritating change from Frank's original--but it does read well here. I did enjoy the growth of characters Stilgar and Gurney as they waged war on other planets and eventually longed for home. And the adventure in Paul's boyhood with Duncan Idaho was especially entertaining. The view of different planets was done well, also, giving the reader a change from just desert or palace. Stilgar especially, endures swamps and rivers, a grueling endeavor for a desert borne man.

Politics, violence, and religion--ideas which hold a spell over humanity today, and in the future, encompass PAUL OF DUNE. This is an awesome read, giving each of us food for thought on mankind's current troubles.

I promised myself that I would never read another Herbert/Anderson 'addendum' to the original Dune series after the disaster that was The Butlerian Jihad. However, due to forgetting to send in my negative desire for this book to the SF book club, it showed up on my doorstep, and obsessive reader that I am, I eventually cracked the covers of this book.

Surprisingly, it's not an unmitigated disaster, but rather a book that fills some holes between Dune and Dune Messiah, and almost managed to convince me that this extra material 'fit' with the original. However, there are some strong inconsistencies with the original, most notably in the portrayed actions and feelings of certain Fremen Maud'Dib worshipers, a rewriting of history to allow Paul to be offworld prior to the events of the original Dune, and a fleshing out of some the characters of the originals, most notably Irulan, that doesn't truly match Frank Herbert's portrayal.

While still having the short chapter/quick switch between scenes and characters that are now the hallmark of the Herbert/Anderson writing style, for this particular book such treatment actually works, as the plot threads are sufficiently many and convoluted enough to allow for such treatment. And the portrayals of the various characters weren't so obviously wrong as to cause me to throw this book away in disgust. However, this is very faint praise, merely an acknowledgement that the original characters of Frank Herbert were very powerful, real people, and as this book follows these original people, with only a few new persons thrown in, some of that power still permeates this book. This book also manages to avoid any ridiculously obvious scientific boners, mainly by not making any scientific statements of importance, but this is certainly preferable to the nonsense that has filled some of the other volumes.

However, the conclusion of this volume is an extreme letdown and is very poorly thought out, as it hinges on Paul and all of his close advisors willfully ignoring an obvious threat. But perhaps this is not surprising, as another threat earlier in the book is also completely ignored until it is sprung with deadly consequences, even though Paul has a prescient dream with clear significance - darn it, I caught the reference, even though it's been about five years since I last re-read the original Dune, and certainly someone who lived through that particular incident would see the relevance much more easily.

Better than some of the other works about Dune this pair has written, but that's not saying a great deal.

---Reviewed by Patrick Shepherd (hyperpat)