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[Wensih]

After a year break after finishing God Emperor, I have returned to the universe of Rakkis in Heretics of Dune. My girlfriend and I were discussing the intricacies of the series all the conflicting forces (CHOAM, Landsraad, Bene Gesserit, Atreides, Tleilaxu, Ixians, etc.) and ideologies, the focus on a solely human inhabited universe (no intelligent life outside of humans and even a lot of the fauna have Earthly origins), the evolution of religion, words, planets, concepts, and the constantly changing perception of all these that are foreshadowed in Dune but are only ever brought to light and expanded upon to their full potential in the sequels. In short, Dune, as a series, is incredible which is why I found it weird to read multiple threads throughout the years on this forum stating that only Dune is worth reading because the others are "weird".

I think the reason people think the other books are weird is because they focus more on plotting, diplomacy, relations, and actions that take place behind the scenes and which turn the series into a true science fiction epic. The orignal Dune always felt more similar to a Fantasy-Adventure novel than a space-opera, especially as it deals more with a prince's journey to reclaim the throne.

It's sad to see so many people write the other books off because they are unique ("weird"). I'm currently 100 pages in Heretics of Dune and think it's fantastic! Dune shouldn't be considered and recommended as the stopping point of the series as doing so creates a void in understanding the ingenious world developed throughout the series.

 

[New002]

I made it through part of Hunters of Dune before I called it quits. I read from Dune straight through to Hunters of Dune and the change in author(s) was just too jarring. I hated it to be honest. Really enjoyed all of Frank Herbert's books though.

 

[Brakke]

I dunno. I just yesterday told someone they could stop after Dune and be happy. The thing is Dune is the best at being Dune, but the rest aren't the best at being what they are. Plus the way the series falls apart into trash is really frustrating after investing so many hundreds of pages in it. So you're better off moving on to something else entirely after the first.

I like the following books though. They're definitely not a waste of time. I guess I figure Dune is canon: everyone should read it. The rest aren't essential.

 

[Wensih]

I made it through part of Hunters of Dune before I called it quits. I read from Dune straight through to Hunters of Dune and the change in author(s) was just too jarring. I hated it to be honest. Really enjoyed all of Frank Herbert's books though.

I tried to specify that I was solely talking about Frank Herbert's Series as each successive book I've enjoyed thoroughly, probably more so than the original.

 

[Ferrio]

It's sad to see so many people write the other books off because they are unique ("weird"). I'm currently 100 pages in Heretics of Dune and think it's fantastic! Dune shouldn't be considered and recommended as the stopping point of the series as doing so creates a void in understanding the ingenious world developed throughout the series.

Shit gets weird, like creepy weird you haven't seen anything yet. I love heretics, introduces my favorite character in the series. Yet stuff happens in this book and chapterhouse that makes me wonder wtf was going through Frank's mind.

 

[hydrophilic attack]

God Emperor was my favourite in the series

 

[Team Filler]

I love the original six books, but no lies are being told when people say that shit gets weird. Keep reading, you'll see!

 

[CyclopsRock]

I didn't even enjoy the first one! I only read it a few years ago and I've already forgotten basically all of it, but I remember finding the whole thing a total slog that I was looking forward to ending.

 

[cntr]

Shit gets weird, like creepy weird you haven't seen anything yet. I love heretics, introduces my favorite character in the series. Yet stuff happens in this book and chapterhouse that makes me wonder wtf was going through Frank's mind.

A lot of New Wave authors did literally take drugs.

 

[bndadm]

I need to give them a re-read, but when reading God-Emperor or Dune I was baffled, then intrigued, then blown away.

The messages and themes in that book and about what the God-Emperor did and why feel very relevant to today. It demands discussion about apathy and lethargy and dependence as a species.

Reaching Chapterhouse though, while enjoyable, really does take it out there.

Actually didn't mind the pre-dune House trilogy (though I was young at the time), but all of the New Dune stuff I see is rather by the numbers and poorly written. Never did read the "finale".

 

[Wensih]

After finishing Heretics of Dune, I wanted to update this post to share my thoughts. I thought Heretics was the most intriguing of the Dune books. I understand why people say it's weird as the tonal shift on controlling societies through sex and the vivid depictions of sex is something that has always been present in Dune but has never been in the forefront.

Honored Matres and Tleilaxu are really great and interesting opposing forces, and while the latter are involved in many aspects of the series prior to Heretics, the exploration of their society in Heretics is much appreciated.

I loved the plotting nature and conspiracies that ran throughout Heretics, and there was a good chunk of action in the book as well.

 

[Wag]

I read all of them, and loved them for what they were. They transported me to another universe.

Whatever you do don't read any of Brian Herbert's books, they'll totally ruin the experience for you.

 

[Anjelus_]

I can't stand it when people say the other Messiah - Chapterhouse are bad and to stop at Dune 1.

Uh... a lot of people like the rest of the series even more than the original. You have no idea how someone is going to react to the other books just because you personally didn't like them. Post-Dune1 books are different but they're still well made and contain so many brilliant ideas. God Emperor is my personal favorite.

But yes, fuck the Brian Herbert books. I hate that those even exist.

 

[i_am_ben]

eh the rot set in with the second book.

 

[CyclopsRock]

You have no idea how someone is going to react to the other books just because you personally didn't like them.

This is literally what opinions are though, isn't it?

 

[purdobol]

Read all of them. And the strongest impression left the first one and God Emperor.
Two very different books may i add. I agree with OP tho.

 

[El Topo]

Just don't read the Brian Herbert books. Whatever you do, don't read those. Avoid them at all costs.

 

[FlyingSaucer]

Just don't read the Brian Herbert books. Whatever you do, don't read those. Avoid them at all costs.

They aren't books; they are bad fanfiction.

 

[RevengeOfDoh]

Dune will always be #1 for me, but I have a hard time ranking Messiah and Emperor. Both are really interesting in their own right. I never liked what happened to Alia though; it left a really bad taste in my mouth similar to how we were told what happened to Halleck's sister.

 

[genjiZERO]

IMO only the first one is a masterpiece. The second and third are tolerable, but I had no desire to continue reading. It just got bloated with no sense of direction.

 

[Number_6]

IMO only the first one is a masterpiece. The second and third are tolerable, but I had no desire to continue reading. It just got bloated with no sense of direction.

Should have read God Emperor. The "golden path" culminates in this book.

 

[Barkley's Justice]

I can't recall whether I made it all the way through Heretics or not, I may have stopped.

My interested is piqued, however, with all this "weird" talk regarding Chapterhouse...But I'm just gonna Wikipedia.

 

[Dcube]

I absolutely loved the first three, some of my favorite books. The fourth got really dull and I had to force myself to finish it, but at least it finished off that storyline.
Heretics and Chapterhouse though were just a waste of time, so forgettable.

 

[ThusZarathustra]

Thematically there's really no reason to read beyond the first book. You don't need to see the arc play out to get Herberts point about messiah figures and exploiting ignorance for gain. The other books are still good, but not as tight, I think.

 

[Ezalc]

I stopped after the first one because I hate stories that rely on super protagonists from a prophecy.

 

[Zzoram]

I think going up to God Emperor of Dune is key. It concludes the Golden Path, which ends up making good sense.

Spoiler

The idea of spreading out humanity across the entire universe and creating more genetic diversity to maximize the chance that humans will survive somewhere no matter what happens is what we should eventually strive for as a species.

Everything post-God Emperor is unnecessary.

 

[Zzoram]

I stopped after the first one because I hate stories that rely on super protagonists from a prophecy.

Funny enough, book 4, God Emperor of Dune, is exactly about breaking free from and ending the viability of prophets and prophecies.

 

[Woorloog]

Everything post-God Emperor is unnecessary.

I keep wondering if Herbert meant to write some other scifi story but decided to set it into Duniverse for whatever reason. Thematically post-GE works feel a lot different, i think.
I mean, Herbert had written other scifi works but Dune was and is his most famous work so perhaps he thought, why not cash in on the fame?

It is interesting to note how Lynch's Dune film affected Herberts descriptions of things. The city on Gammu (Giedi Prime) for example, it is as if it straight from Lynch's film. The way Navigators are described is closer to Lynch's vision than how Edric was described in Dune Messiah.
There are other, smaller things as well, IIRC. Been sometime since i read them (Dune i read roughly once per year).

 

[Maledict]

Just don't read any of the books written by his son or Kevin J Anderson.

They are beyond redeemable - utter shite on every possible level, in a way that actually reaches back in time and lessens the quality of the original books.

Also, the Dune Encyclopedia is well worth reading as well, even if it is no longer canon.

 

[tokkun]

The introduction of gholas sapped a lot of my interest in the series. Once you can bring characters back from the dead it really diminishes the consequence of anything that happens. It also seemed to feed into the series' problem of retreading the same characters, factions, and themes over and over.

The strength of Dune was always its world-building, not its prose or characters. But the world struggles to evolve. Even with God Emperor supposedly completely changing the playing field, after 5000 years it is still basically the same factions contending for power.

 

[Woorloog]

The introduction of gholas sapped a lot of my interest in the series. Once you can bring characters back from the dead it really diminishes the consequence of anything that happens. It also seemed to feed into the series' problem of retreading the same characters, factions, and themes over and over.

The ghola technology allows for exploration of the said technology's effects. It isn't about the characters, but how living again and again and again affects them and the world.

 

[theepicoftyler]

I read Dune, Dune Messiah and Children of Dune. I felt like I had my fill by then. The first two are near perfect for my taste though.

The turn from Paul being the hero of the Fremen to being the force behind a monumental genocide is one of my favorite things.

 

[Ether_Snake]

Stopped reading Dune when the prince dude is in the desert and the empire dudes are looking for him. Too many names to remember, too many weird words, was long and boring.

 

[tokkun]

The ghola technology allows for exploration of the said technology's effects. It isn't about the characters, but how living again and again and again affects them and the world.

It's treated that way in Dune Messiah, but later it is more of a plot device for bringing back characters

Spoiler

like Miles Teg

. The series also already had avenues for exploring those themes, like ancestral memory and the 3000-year reign of Leto II.

 

[Woorloog]

It's treated that way in Dune Messiah, but later it is more of a plot device for bringing back characters

Spoiler

like Miles Teg

. The series also already had avenues for exploring those themes, like ancestral memory and the 3000-year reign of Leto II.

I'd say it would be a cop-out not to utilize ghola technology for immortality. I recall the laser-shield explosion is used as a common weapon in the post-GE novels... Everything's fair game. It is poor scifi if a world-changing invention is ignored, even if the price is getting the same characters back again.

Ancestral memory and Leto II are not the same as a being reincarnated again and again, the former is not real existence (pretty sure the novels make it clear, it is a "pseudo-life"), and Leto II was an unique being.

It is unfortunate we never got the finale for the series, we don't know why Duncan had all of his ghola-life memories and other things :/

 

[Sub_Level]

Truly a masterpiece.

 

[Sober]

Just don't read the Brian Herbert books. Whatever you do, don't read those. Avoid them at all costs.

I want to be super generous and say maybe the Butlerian Jihad series is stomachable because it's so far removed from the events of Dune/God Emperor/Heretics but even then it's really still bad and full of filler and padding that it's really not worth it.

I read like maybe 50 pages into the first book BH/KJA wrote to continue after Chapterhouse and I just kinda didn't want to.

 

[El Topo]

Whenever I think about giving Brian Herbert's books another try, I remember The Oracle of Time and do something else. Anything else, really.

 

[Hyperactivity]

Read up to half of Heretics of Dune.

The last 2 books weren't as intriguing for me, but I enjoyed the first 4, even if Messiah and God Emperor could get REALLY weird

 

[Number_6]

I stopped after the first one because I hate stories that rely on super protagonists from a prophecy.

But this one is different.

Spoiler

Paul decides to play the role of messiah. He joins the Fremen but he consciously uses their loyalty and faith to further his own agenda. In the end, he gives in to his horrific visions, and the Fremen way of life is ultimately destroyed, more or less.

It is not the cliche prophecy setup found in so many movies. The prophecy itself is fake, part of very long term contingency plans and meant to be exploited.

 

[Schweinehund]

I forget the name of the book but whatever one does the massive time jump is where I stopped. The 1-2 books after Dune were really good though.

 

[kinn]

I didn't even enjoy the first one! I only read it a few years ago and I've already forgotten basically all of it, but I remember finding the whole thing a total slog that I was looking forward to ending.

I got to agree with you. Didn't really like it. We are definitely in the minority!

 

[NonexistentK]

afaik 2nd book was mostly finished when Dune was published, and the third one was at least all planned out by the time the original came out.

Frank Herbert did tons and tons of research into economics, agriculture, religion for writing Dune, and he did so much preparation for the novel that by the time he finished writing Dune he had the material and plans for writing the first three novels.

 

[Stinkles]

I like ALL the Frank Herbert novels. COME AT ME

 

[Red Mage]

Just don't read any of the books written by his son or Kevin J Anderson.

They are beyond redeemable - utter shite on every possible level, in a way that actually reaches back in time and lessens the quality of the original books.

Also, the Dune Encyclopedia is well worth reading as well, even if it is no longer canon.

Yep. I read the finale that they wrote and it was awful. Almost everything that Frank sets up in the two preview books are wasted.

 

[Man]

God Emperor of Dune (#4) is my favorite and fits perfectly as a finale to the saga.

 

[GunslingerVit]

Just don't read the Brian Herbert books. Whatever you do, don't read those. Avoid them at all costs.

GunslingerVit will remember this.

 

[tokkun]

It is unfortunate we never got the finale for the series, we don't know why Duncan had all of his ghola-life memories and other things :/

Based on Chapterhouse, had we gotten a finale we might have seen ghola Paul, ghola Gurney, and ghola Hawat, among others. The Brian Herbert version brings back a bunch of OG characters as gholas, and it's just as much of a trainwreck as you might expect.

 

[Jedi2016]

I've only read the six books. That's all there is as far as I'm concerned.

 

[tearsintherain]

I've read all the Frank books, liked it up to God Emperor and thought the rest was ... weird. Ok, but weird and didn't really add to the mythos of the universe in a good way. The final chapter of the last Frank book was just so weird.

Then I read all of his son's books. Each one worse than the previous. It was amazing how much worse it got, like the authors were hate writing to see how much shit the readers could take. BUT I READ THEM ALL, SO WHO'S LAUGHING NOW BRIAN.

Not me

The worst was how Brian and Anderson took little bits from the original series and expanded, expanded, and expanded on them to the point of ludicrousness. Like the final chapter of the last book, he tried to explain what exactly happened. Yes, it was awful.