Really enjoyed this considering I knew nothing about it. Very lovecraftian in feel

Wow weird barely begins to describe this book. I'm overly familiar with all the Dune books and was unprepared for something that takes place on this planet. I feel like this book would make a hell of a movie.

One of the best of several stories from Herbert that hinge on a community set apart from the rest of civilization.

This one can read a bit like an episode of The Twilight Zone, but Herbert's imagination is what really sets apart stuff like The Santaroga Barrier from heaps of other pulpy sci-fi from this era.

Another excellent piece of science fiction by Herbert. Thoughtful and creepy. The letdown is the poor, borderline sexist characterisation of the lead female character.
EDIT: Finished the novel. There are obvious thematic links between this book's Jaspers and Dune's Spice - both are mysterious, consciousness expanding narcotics, that are addictive and mold society. So if you'd like to know what some of the main thrusts of Dune are - and a hint of Herbert's views on drugs - this book is highly recommended.

I enjoyed the novel, and thought that it was close enough to the quality of his Dune books.

The protagonist’s sentimentality is what I would expect from young, post-WWII pulp writers, which makes me think that maybe this was a trunk novel, at least begun in the early 50s while Herbert was living in Santa Rosa and working as a writer for the PD (Press Democrat). I think he should have made Dr. Dasein a first year graduate student, being sent out (in naïve enthusiasm) by his advisor, Dr. Selador (it would have made his hook-up with Jenny slightly less creepy). I don’t think he needed to explain the Jaspers’ origin (which he didn’t) but I was left with an ambivalent feeling as to whether it had a positive or negative moral value. The chain-store-consortium is obviously evil—as was Selador—but we’re still left with the potential of evil in Santaroga (is there an entity dedicated to killing outsiders?) and the threat from without. This would be okay, if he was going to write a sequel, but this was published three years after Dune, and I think Herbert saw the novel as a stand-alone.

Very interesting, a psychological thriller with a lot of (mental) twists.

Ho iniziato a leggere questo romanzo senza aspettarmi troppo, non saprei dirne il motivo. Forse perché quando si nomina Herbert, si pensa quasi unicamente alla saga di Dune, e quindi mi aspettavo che le altre sue opere non fossero all’altezza. Fortunatamente mi sbagliavo.
“The Santaroga barrier” mi ha preso fin dai primi capitoli. La struttura stessa della trama è fatta apposta per coinvolgere il lettore gradualmente, man mano che il mistero di Santaroga viene svelato. Il protagonista stesso passa gradualmente dallo stato di outsider guardato con sospetto, a membro della comunità di Santaroga, ma il passaggio è tutt’altro che indolore, e ve ne accorgerete.
La chiave di tutto (come si intuisce già dai primi capitoli) è il Jaspers, potente droga in grado di amplificare la coscienza. Il Jaspers è palesemente reminiscente del melange di Arrakis, ma qui esso rappresenta il vero e proprio fulcro della narrazione. I suoi effetti sul protagonista vengono descritti...

Contiuna qui:
http://figura4.com/review/show/29-la-...

While it's not the Dune series, The Santaroga Barrier contains some similar elements. In Dune "The Spice" is the mysterious drug that is ingested into the entire culture and fabric of the community. The Santaroga Barrier has "Jaspers" that has the same effect on the residents. The book is about the community of Santaroga and its ability to shut out the rest of the world from entering. It's a decent fantasy novel by Herbert. It probably would have given it a 3.5 if possible.

_The Santaroga Barrier_ by Frank Herbert features an odd choice for a hero; Dr. Gilbert Dasein, a psychologist from the University of California at Berkeley, employed to do of all things a market study. Meyer Davidson, agent of a powerful investment corporation, one that owns a chain of retail stores, was upset about what was termed in the marketing world as the "Santaroga Barrier," Santaroga being a small farming community and town located in an idyllic mountain valley in California. Davidson was upset that his corporation - as well as others before him - had failed utterly in selling a variety of products to the people of Santaroga. No on in Santaroga bought cigarettes- those very few that were sold were bought by transients, people stopping in the community's one service station to buy gas - nor did they buy any wine, beer, produce, or cheese brought from outside the valley. The people of Santaroga would only eat vegetables, fruits, cheese, beer, and wine raised or made within the valley. A great many Santarogans worked to produce these items only for local consumption, as they "didn't travel well." The largest of these institutions was the Jaspers Cheese Cooperative, a large factory-like complex that employed many in the little town.

Dasein, with the help of the head of the university's psychology department, Dr. Chami Selador (working outside Santaroga), uncovered a few more interesting facts, notably that outsiders never found a house to rent or buy in the valley, no one moved out, and Santaroga never reported any mental illness, juvenile delinquency, or crime to state officials. All businesses, including the bank and the gas station, were locally owned. A few Santarogans left to go to college outside the valley - that was where Dasein met his girlfriend, Jenny Sorge, a native of Santaroga - and a few others served in the draft in Vietnam (the book was published and presumably set in 1968; various minor details such automobile technology, clothing styles, and the like point to this time period but are not essential to the story), though many come back due to unexplained allergic reactions to Army food.

Mindful of the lack of success of previous attempts to understand this mysterious "Barrier" and particularly of the fact that the last two people to investigate Santaroga met accidental deaths, Dasein journeyed to the town. Dasein finds at first a seemingly normal town of diners, farms, nice homes, a post office, and the like, a typical agricultural community. Several things though begin to get his attention; he isn't there long before he notices that the townspeople have a certain way about them, that they all seem very alert, to have excellent memories, a bit abrupt, sometimes rude, but at other times extremely caring and solicitous. Also, they are unfailingly and unswervingly honest, again almost to the point of rudeness. In addition, it seems everyone he meets knows who he is and his relationship to Jenny Sorge, as well as often knowing in general what he had done earlier that day.

Of greater interest though is the nearly fatal accident that befalls Dasein upon his arrival. His first night in the town's one inn nearly was his last as he almost succumbed to an old-fashioned gas jet for a lamp that was left on high. When he awakens after that ordeal, he finds that his briefcase - with his notes for the study - is missing and is in the possession of the town's lone law enforcement official. Invited to dine with him the next day, the man, Captain Al Marden of the Highway Patrol, questions his intentions in the town, making it obvious that he had gone through Dasien's belongings. While not threatening Dasein, Marden made it clear that the people of Santaroga were well aware of his reasons for being in the town, and while they supported " our Jenny" and therefore tolerated Dasein (to an extent), they did not care a lot for his marketing study. Dasein started to notice patterns in the speech and thoughts of Santarogans, of them often speaking of a "they" and a "we" and viewing the outside world in hostile terms, of being greatly suspicious of those from outside the valley, dealing with them only as much as they had to.

So, are the people of Santaroga just mildly eccentric, perhaps survivalists of a sort, wishing to have as little to do as possible with life outside of Santaroga? Or is there something else at work, something perhaps sinister, otherworldly, and alien? This being a science fiction novel, I am sure you can guess the answer, at least in general terms. The process where Dasein uncovers just what makes Santaroga the way it is was interesting and well written. Herbert did an excellent job building up a sense of mystery, and I enjoyed Dasein's interactions with a cast of very well drawn characters, notably Marden, Winston Burdeaux (a waiter at the Inn, one of the few "Negroes" in the town and not originally native to the valley), and Dr. Piaget, uncle to Jenny Sorge and the town doctor. If there was a weak point, it was Jenny Sorge; I never could determine why Dasien loved her so much, I found her character a bit vacuous, not as well drawn as many of the others, though it is possible Herbert meant it to be this way.

As Dasein got further and further into the mystery (and further and further under the influence of Santaroga's spell), there were many philosophical discussions, several I am sure reflecting points Herbert wanted to make about life and society as a whole. Many of these were made during some rather lengthy exchanges between Piaget and Dasien. It seemed that in addition to the "Jaspers effect" that was at work Piaget was trying to appeal to Dasien as a psychologist, to become one of them, a native of Santaroga.

An interesting and short early novel of Herbert, I read it in a little over a day.

Felt like a smaller scale dune with a bad ending...

A really good idea. One can see that it was written in the 60s, the LSD time, one big drug trip.

The beginning was great. A real page turner. All this mystery and unexplained things happening. Unfortunately it is a bit anti climatic. The ending had me disappointed. The book has more of the philosophical discussions at the end like many sci fi books from that time. But somehow they didn't win me over. So in that case I would have preferred him to go deeper into Jasper and the village. But I liked it a lot until pretty much the last few chapters.

What I did like about the ending though is that one asks oneself, was this a happy ending? Frank Herbert said that half of the readers will see it as a dystopia and the other half as utopia. And this is very true.

I remember reading this nearly 50 years ago and being quite taken with it. It's a bit dated now, but still pretty good, and a lot more ambiguous than I seem to have noticed the first time - ha. I think, given the chance, I would have happily moved to Santaroga back then. A little less comfortable with the unconscious self-preservation tactics this time through.

Interesting.