Heretics of Dune

Le scelte attuate dall'Imperatore-Dio durante il suo tirannico dominio hanno permesso alla razza umana di uscire dal giogo della sua stessa maledizione e di espandersi nell'universo senza limiti.

Avete amato il primo libro, sofferto per le scelte di Paul nel secondo e accompagnato suo figlio Leto nell'accettare la grande e tragica responsabilità del Sentiero Dorato nel terzo. Vi siete persi nelle speculazioni filosofiche dell'Imperatore-Dio nel quarto. In questo quinto romanzo avete la possibilità di trovare la chiave di lettura dell'intera opera e svelare finalmente il significato del Sentiero Dorato e delle scelte compiute ma dovete fare molta attenzione perché Herbert non ci rende la vita semplice.

Inferiore ai precedenti romanzi ma non meno intrigante, con dialoghi e situazioni complesse, per lo più statiche, che sembrano allontanare dall'epicità di Dune. Non del tutto.
L'ennesimo ghola di Duncan e la giovane Sheeana sono protagonisti particolari, frutto delle scelte passate e chiave per il futuro.
Uno sguardo più approfondito sull'affascinante mondo del Bene Tleilax con i suoi segreti e una nuova minaccia per l'umanità, le Matres Onorate di ritorno dalla Dispersione.
Romanzo utile alla comprensione del tema generale dell'opera.

I guess I'm not like a lot of these other reviewers. I thought this book, the fifth in the series, was fantastic and probably my second favorite after the first one. It's got that perfect Dune blend of sci-fi, politics, religion, intrigue, action, and great characters. I literally couldn't put this book down after the first 150 pages or so. The story begins some 1500 years after the death of Leto II from God Emperor of Dune and brings us up to speed on what happened in the aftermath of his death and the following power vacuum. In the intervening years, The Famine Times and The Scattering have expanded the universe's human population, both in terms of number and presence. But now people, known as The Lost Ones, are starting to come back, and not all of them are simply returning peacefully with what they've learned and seen, to their homeworlds...The intricate plot becomes much clearer when all of the threads are woven together at the end, although my one gripe is that there is a bit of a jarring jump into the last two chapters in terms of what happens...really, I just want to know HOW the events I deduced actually occurred. But that's a minor quibble. This is a great book and I can't wait to begin the next one (and the last one Herbert wrote before his death). A major threat to universal stability has emerged, and at the end of this book, it's no guarantee that the forces of good will win. Much like The Empire Strikes Back, this middle of the second trilogy of Dune book ends with the good guys on the ropes and the future uncertain. Masterful stuff.

Completing each subsequent Dune book is always exhausting. On this, my finally-got-through-it complete reading of Heretics, I realized that last time I tried to read it, I stalled out 70 pages from the end -- that's how much of a grind these books can be.

But unlike the first four volumes, I don't really have the same sense of reward or accomplishment at finishing this one. Like most of the other books, Herbert doesn't really reveal what the book is about until the last fifteen pages or so. Most of the book follows two groups of characters on the run, each protecting a Chosen One from the evil powers that wish to destroy them. Throughout the book, each group repeatedly escapes some offscreen threat and then argues amongst themselves about the next course of action before a new threat emerges, at which point Herbert cuts away to the other group just as the action starts. And, as with most of the other Dune books, Herbert is far more interested in these in-between moments of discussion, usually between characters with various levels of prescience that are each trying to outwit the other. However, Herbert is uninterested -- almost to a fault -- in describing action. Most of the time this just means he's playing to his strengths, but in Heretics (especially in its final pages, where most of the plot takes place), so much happens in the space between chapters, paragraphs, and even sentences that the reader is often playing a frustrating amount of catch up. It's also just a drag to spend 200-300 pages setting up a story that unfolds most of its most important ideas in the last three chapters.

So structurally, there's much to be desired. Herbert likes a slow burn, but the psychological tension, use of language, or simply the espousal of philosophy is typically the real draw anyway. Unfortunately, Heretics is also just sort of criminally stupid in terms of what it actually focuses on. For example, the plots and themes of the first four Dune novels are about the nature of political power, of the limitations of human will and its relation to time and society.

However, Heretics of Dune is about two competing sects of sex nuns. The Good sex nuns are trying to protect one of the Chosen Ones from the bad sex nuns, who are a threat because they are better at full body orgasms. The twist is that this Chosen One is even better at full body orgasms, and therefore the Good sex nuns have to come up with a new plan for how to harness his uncontrollable sex powers.

There's also some culturally insensitive stuff about Islam that completely undoes everything about religion that Herbert handled more thoughtfully in the previous books, but it doesn't really matter because in the end everyone in that part of the book is either dead or having sex with the sex nuns.

This is, really-I-am-not-kidding, the whole plot of this book for the first 445 pages. In the last 25 pages, it changes into an entirely different book that is actually interesting and not something you are embarrassed to type in a Goodreads review, but most of THAT happens offscreen and is described in a serious of rhetorical questions in the last 4 pages.

Also Herbert manages to throw in some digs at Star Wars (deserved) and fancy restaurants (like, he is very angry with restaurants for some reason).

Anyway, I don't even fucking know with this book. There is a giant penis on the front cover that is even more of a giant penis than the giant penises on the other books. That's probably all you need to know.

Also happy new year.

75/100
Un libro di satelliti, interlocutorio, senza le grandi figure che contraddistinguono gli altri testi. Insomma, senza gli Atreides... a parte Miles Teg, che però ha un ruolo da comprimario. Anche alla rilettura, a metà libro faticavo a ricordare come Herbert avesse districato la matassa, specialmente dei "pov" (che non sono pov perché è in terza persona) di Taraza, che sono insopportabili. Le ultime 50 pagine, veramente epiche, secondo me, portano il libro a 3 stelle e mezza. Ma non di più. Nettamente il peggiore dei 6, ma si sapeva.

Questo libro mi ha fatto ben sperare all'inizio di avere qualche spiegazione in più sulla Via Aurea vista da Leto e su queste specie di streghe delle Bene Gesserit, invece ancora una volta mi sono ritrovata in un colossale intrigo tra Theilaxu, Bene Gesserit e le nuove arrivate sulla scena, le Matres Onorate; tutto un gran casino, a mio parere sfuggito di mano ad un certo punto pure allo scrittore, che mi ha lasciato tanti interrogativi ancora aperti e che probabilmente non si chiuderanno mai. Insomma una bella confusione!
Non riesco, proprio non riesco ad abbandonare un libro,soprattutto se poi mi viene regalato e quindi, a colpi di sbadigli, ho proseguito fino a quando non rispunta sulla scena colui che mi sta facendo continuare questa serie : Duncan Idaho con la sua ennesima versione (leggere i precedenti libri per saperne di più). Là dove c'era Siona, ora c'è Sheena che tutti vogliono disperatamente per il suo potere con i vermoni della sabbia, parti del Tiranno o Gran Dio del precedente volume (anche qui leggere il libro per capire qualcosina è essenziale). Poi c'è Odrade, una Bene Gesserit che ammetto mi ha stupito alla fine quando ha capito finalmente quale era il piano della Reverenda Madre di questa specie di setta di streghe. Dato che, alla fin fine, è tutto un gran casino di genetica, mi ha fatto piacere ritrovare sulla scena anche vecchi personaggi con nuovi nomi che però ricordano tutto (sempre per il concetto della prescienza).
E le Matres Onorate, praticamente una costola eretica delle Bene Gesserit, si possono definire tutto,tranne che poco furbe ( il succo del vero potere ce l'hanno proprio loro, altro che la famigerata "spezia" visto che le altre hanno deciso di spegnere completamente i sentimenti umani e proseguire nei loro intrugli genetici).
Negli ultimi capitoli ci viene presentato,in modo molto caotico, anche qualcosina di alcuni mondi, che secondo me sono davvero interessanti, dove naturalmente ruota tutto intorno al Potere, ma finalmente ci sono elementi di fantascienza veri e propri.
Sinceramente, non ho capito bene se finisce questa storia perché un personaggio è ancora lì che sta vagando, o se lo ritroverò nell'ultimo volume; un altro ha tirato le cuoia che manco me ne sono accorta, viene spiegato così, en-passant, tra un capitolo e l'altro.
Nel complesso, sostengo che questa serie continua ad essere molto particolare, a tratti molto "womens power",ma assolutamente non di facile lettura. Per fortuna mi manca l'ultimo volume,ora faccio un intervallo e poi lo inizio.

dnf - at page 103 0f 669. This is gonna be one of the more unhinged Dune reviews but for enduring this much of Frank's writing I think I have earned it. I have realized I simply don't have tolerance anymore for this man's bullshit. I really don't want to have to read at inch worm pace because Frank refuses to give the reader information or give important details the space they need. I don't care that Duncan Idaho is back for the 5 millionth fucking time. In fact, I kinda feel like him being back again retroactively makes the last book worse! The entirety of that book went to show how Duncan was an outdated model that was prone to being disobedient and ultimately unhelpful to the goals of whoever made him, so why the fuck is he back again? Great question! Frank never explained it in any way that makes sense beyond: "he needs to fuck that 5 year old girl on Rakis (which is Frank's new iteration on Dune's name)" which I refuse to accept as an explanation.

A list of other things I hate about this book:
- I'm tired of Frank throwing in random new facts and expecting me to call him a genius for it. Why are the chairs living dogs? Why? You have to extrapolate why a development this drastic this deep into the series is happening beyond a character saying "i hate that she had me sitting on the living dog chairs." I don't need that much more just a little bit. Just like 2 sentences saying this was done for xyz. Just give me reason to think you did this for any other reason than "i think its cool."
- I despise that Frank refuses to show me the interesting parts of this world. What happened to the Spacing Guild? They were so cool and had a genuinely interesting dynamic of being able to do what Paul could do but not utilizing it in the same way. Why are they just gone ever since the second book?
- I also don't fucking care about the Bene Gesserit. You exhausted the only things interesting about them in book 2. I don't care that they are infighting. Why is this being treated as something new?? This has been happening literally since THE FIRST BOOK.
- Why was the majority of the first 100 pages of this book focused on some random who gives a fuck Mentat that is training Duncan version 10000000 on how to use weapons. I DONT CARE!

I hear so much about how Frank's son taking over the series is bad, but to be honest I really can't conceive how he can make that dramatically shittier of a plot than what Frank already had cooked up. The problem with those books could just be that Brian is relying on this horseshit as a base material rather than his skill as an author.

I'm not gonna read anything else from the Dune series. At least for a very long time. I'm tired of Frank and I need a break from him.

As a parting gift here is Frank saying liberals are the problem in the galaxy:
"'Only liberals really think. Only liberals are intellectual. Only liberals understand the needs of their fellows.' How much viciousness lay concealed in that word! Odrade thought. How much secret ego demanding to feel superior."

Too much sexual nonsense. I prefer the way sex was treated almost purely achademically in the previous books. I thought Dune is supposed to be sci-fi, not porn.

Dune Sapkınları 5. Kitap
Dune Sapkınları kitabını çok beğendiğimi söyleyemeyeceğim. İlk dört kitaba nazaran biraz zayıf buldum. Seride sadece üçüncü kitabı sevmemiştim beş de biraz onun kıvamında ilerledi. Konu karakter geçişleri çok hızlıydı ve belirli noktalarda kesilince olaylar, okumaya ket vurdu. Bu eserde kadınlar çok ön plana çıkarılmıştı ama dördüncü kitaptaki bütünlükten sonra beşi okuyunca biraz sıkıldım. Yine de her şeye rağmen yazarın yarattığı evren ve karakterler çok üst düzey. Şimdi son kitap kaldı fakat onu birkaç ay sonra okumayı planlıyorum.