[BOOK] Thinking about reading Dune

This. I read Dune when it came out (good old SF Bookclub!) and was blown away. Simply outstanding! Looked forward to sequels when I heard that Herbert was writing at least one, and boy, was I ever disappointed. I'd read Dune and then move on to something else, although you might have a different opinion about the first couple of sequels, which weren't bad, just not nearly as good as Dune. A classic is The Foundation Trilogy, by Issac Asimov, who also wrote I, Robot, the novel Will Smith's flick was based on (not a bad movie, either). A more recent novel is the Hugo Award winning Redshirts, by John Scalzi. It's a satire on Star Trek. That's all I'm going to say. Not remotely as long as Dune. Heck, below is a list of several really, really good SF novels, some may be listed by others.

The Left Hand of Darkness, by Ursula K. LeGuin
Stranger in a Strange Land, by Robert A. Heinlein
Red Mars, by Kim Stanley Robinson
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, by Philip K. Dick (my mentor!)
The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett
Childhood's End, by Arthur C. Clarke
Sirens of Titan, by Kurt Vonnegut
Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
The Mote in God’s Eye, by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
Ringworld, by Larry Niven
The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman
Neuromancer, by William Gibson
The Stand, by Stephen King (yes, King writes science fiction!)
Shards of Honor, by Lois McMaster Bujold
Old Man's War, by John Scalzi

That's a few really good science fiction reads that are all classic, in my humble opinion. There are so many more! Hope this helps.

 

You probably could have read 100 pages by now.

 

I couldn't get into this book. I don't remember if I actually finished reading it.

 

Have you read them? Dune Messiah was very interesting. I really liked it, just as much as I liked the first one. Children of Dune was even better IMHO, the preacher was a great character. They weren't that focussed on other planets as the first one, but overal a great interesting read. I do have to ad that I was 16 when I read these books, so I have no Idea how I would like them now.

For people interested the Miniseries of Dune and of these 2 books http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0287839/ was also great (with james McAavoy), but I liked the books better.

After Children of Dune the series became terrible.

 

I agree with all of the this. The Sci-Fi miniseries was surprisingly good and much better than expected. There were actually two Sci-Fi miniseries, one for Dune (first book) and one for Children of Dune (second and third book).

I tried to read the fourth book but it was dreadful and I could not make myself finish it.

 

Speaking of Dune;

http://www.synthtopia.com/content/2014/04/30/kurt-stenzel-the-score-to-jodorowskys-dune/#more-56664

 

The best Sci-Fi book ever Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

Now I wouldn't recommend it for you right now, though, because it scratches a different itch than a book like Dune would.

 

People will probably laugh and point fingers, but L. Ron Hubbard was a great sci-fi writer before, as Cartman would put it, he went 'totally nanners'.

The single best sci-fi book I have ever read (and I have read a LOT of them) is Battlefield Earth. If you ever accidentally damaged your brain by watching that Travolta abortion of a movie, then forget about it, because the only resemblance to the book was the title. Literally, that was it.

The book is astoundingly good, a bit old-school, but an absolute epic ripping yarn.

Also, once you have digested Battlefield Earth, then I also recommend the 10-book series 'Mission Earth', also by Hubbard, which is kind a cross between serious sci-fi and very biting satire.

 

I had that feeling once. I was in the mood for some good, classic sci-fi. And, I figured Dune's got a good reputation, right? But, I couldn't stomach the prose. It might be good storytelling, but the writing is, well, not too great. I couldn't put up with it for more than a few chapters before I gave up.

 

David Lynch totally ruined Dune for me, like, permanently.

I read it in high school, it was trippy and all, but then the movie came out and it was stomach-turning in its awfulness.

 

Has anybody seen Jodorowsky's DUNE? It's a documentary about a Dune movie that never happened but looks like it could have been epic.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/GOaGoFqTWtw" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

That was a box office disaster. Very few people saw that in the theaters.

The main problem with the movie was that Dune the novel has enough material for 3 separate movies. The Sci-Fi miniseries was five hours long and did the material justice.

Lynch had 3 hours of material for the release but the movie studio made him cut it down to less than 1.5 hours in run time. Recipe for disaster. I think the only people who "got" Lynch's Dune were ones who had read the novel and they were pissed that so much was left out.

 

Dune is good, but don't read the sequels, they'll ruin the first book for you.

 

Not many films adapted from a book keep the tone and feel of the original. I thought Lynch did this very well.

Herbert hated it.