Criticism #8: I think Gurney took too many inkvine whips to the head

The following is a quote from Dune:

"I swore an oath to slay the betrayer of your father," Gurney said. "Do you think I can forget the

man who rescued me from a Harkonnen slave pit, gave me freedom, life, and honor ... gave me

friendship, a thing I prized above all else? I have his betrayer under my knife. No one can stop me from --"

Silly Gurney. Little does he know that Duke Leto did not rescue him from a Harkonnen slave pit. Gurney rescued himself and then joined up with a gang of smugglers, as portrayed in the book House Harkonnen.

Why would Gurney lie to Paul and Jessica about this? Both have truth sense and would instantly know that Gurney just lied about something that makes no sense to lie bout. Neither comment, of course.

The alternative is that Gurney can't remember his own personal history. Or something.

I'm sure Brian Herbert and Kevin J Anderson are both perfectly nice people that meant well to write more Dune fiction. But could we at least try to avoid, at the very very least, obvious continuity errors? Is that really too much to ask?

Criticism #7: At least it's something they have in common

The following is from the original Dune:

Not since the day when the Duke's buyers had taken her from the school had she felt this frightened and unsure of herself.

This is a thought Jessica is thinking as she is unpacking their possessions in the Atreides residency.

This is in direct contradiction to the events presented in the House Harkonnen prequel novel, whereby Jessica is basically dropped off by the Bene Gesserit at the Duke's place with no fore knowledge by him and a great deal of suspicion.

Alzheimer's: it brings the Atreides together.

Criticism #6 Shoulda stayed as an Appendix

The novel House Atreides depicts Pardot Kynes, Imperial Planetologist, and his journey from off worlder to Umma, Fremen Holy Man. The novel tells us that Pardot traveled to Arrakis and with a sort of Asperger's like dedication made his way into the good graces of the locals.

He rescued a handful of Fremen children from a group of Harkonnen soldiers that were going to kill them for sport. After being taken to their Sietch, the elders decide that, water debt be damned, they have to kill him. Oblivious that a man who has approached him in a lecture is his assassin, he absent mindfully tells the man to "Remove yourself." The assassin falls on his own knife and Pardot Kynes becomes a holy man.

He marries a Fremen wife, and sets the Fremen as his personal assistants. They go where he says to and takes whatever measurements he asks them to. Tragically he dies in a cave in at Plaster Basin. This story is stretched out over hundreds of pages. It's also summarized in about 5-10 pages in an appendix in the back of Dune.

BH&KJA spent an entire novel telling the EXACT SAME story that Frank Herbert summarized briefly in an entry in the Dune appendix. Absolutely nothing of significance is added to the telling. Anyone creating fiction, whatever medium, can tell you that if you can convey the same thing with less effort, then you need to do some editing. I don't think the Expanded Dune novels were ever edited.

Criticism #5: Murder most casual

Through the House trilogy, Count Fenring, who is basically a serial killer, goes around casually murdering people and no one ever seems to notice. For example, at one point he stabs one of the Emperor's concubines to death for pretty much no reason and no one ever mentions it again.

The most absurd example of this is when Piter de Vries, the Harknonnen mentat, kills the Emperor's wife and yet House Harkonnen is not punished, censored or molested in any way. In fact, nobody really seems to care. The Emperor's freaking wife gets murdered and it's not really a big deal. What the hell?

Criticism #4: Bellonda goes bye bye!

I for one was looking forward to Bellonda's role in Hunters of Dune as Murbella's foil. Alas, BH&KJA dropped a bridge on her.

In Hunters, Bellonda gets exiled to monitor spice operations, where she doesn't participate in the plot at all. Her partner, Doria, an Honored Matre kills her in a petty fight. Murbella forces them to share and then both Doria and Bellonda-within get eaten by a sandworm. Nobody ever seems to notice or comment on this.

Criticism #3: I hope it's not inheritable...

In Dune Duke Leto says the following to Paul:

"The Duke looked at him. "This will be your first time off planet," he said."

Little did he know that Paul has actually been off world a number of times, and was even born off world. This is seen in House Corrino, Paul of Dune and Winds of Dune. Leto seems to be having early Alzheimer's. Everyone is apparently humoring him so as not to hurt his feelings. Either that, or the Expanded Dune novels have no compunction with brazenly contradicting the Original Dune novels.

Ya know, could be either option.

Criticism #2: Leto II meets God

Unpublished Epilogue to God Emperor of Dune

Leto II: So this is what it's like to be dead.

God: Hey.

Leto II: Oh wow, it's Real God. I'm glad I got that Golden Path thing sorted before I died. I have freed humanity from ever again being held under on flag, or exterminated by one foe. I have created a Dark Age so that there will be a Renaissance like never before.

God: Yeah...about that.

Leto II: What? It didn't work? I have prescience like a mother fucker, it had to work.

God: I know you really tried, kid. But in 1500 years Omnius is going to try and exterminate mankind. It'll work too, if he isn't stopped.

Leto II: Omnius? Who the fuck is Omnius?

God: Overmind of the machine empire, they've been building ships since the end of Butlerian Jiahd. He's got back ups of himself in all these nodes. Going to totally exterminate everyone.

Leto II: Nuh-uh. Don't buy it. I would have seen it. Loaded up some Heighliners with nukes and then used my prescience to simultaneously nuke all his cute little nodes from orbit. I woulda kicked his ass.

God: Yeah. But you didn't. Cuz you're all mysterious and stuff.

Leto II: So what do the humans do? Build a big fleet? Loose sandworms in his city? Fight a big war?

God: Look, I hate to be a buzz kill, but here's the deal: They do all those things. But it don't really matter. They could just as easily rolled over and hid. Remember Norma Cenva?

Leto II: She invented fold space engines.

God: She's an omnipotent super being. She can banish Omnius to a parallel dimension with her brain waves.

Leto II: So what the fuck is she waiting for? Do it right now!!

God: She doesn't know where he's at though. For that she has to follow Duncan Idaho there. Really, all that it takes is for Duncan to get captured, taken to Synchrony, then she can zap the bad guy. No reason it has to take longer than five minutes.

Leto II: Granted, I'm half man-half sandworm, but this all seems a little far fetched.

God: Sorry dude.

Leto II: ....

...

this sucks. :(

Criticism #1: the Waff ghola

Being the book I just finished, Sandworms of Dune criticisms are closest to my head. In this novel, the character of the Waff ghola is completely useless. This character does not contribute anything to the storyline nor does any of his actions.

He creates the sea worms. Why? What is the point of the seaworms? They create ultra spice, which is used once by the False Paul. Later, Waff returns to Rakis, fails in his experiments and then sees the worms return from some kind of shell deep underground. All of this could have been taken out.

The False Paul could have simply taken an overdose of regular spice, and then we could remove Waff, all his subplots and then simply make note of the return of the worms at the end. The character was not interesting and contributed nothing to the novel.

Constructive Criticism of the Expanded Dune Novels

When reading them all through, one after the other, a person can't help but notice a quality drop off. Upon finishing all three legends of Dune series and all three books of the House trilogy, within the first few pages of Dune I felt like a traveler lost in a desert, finally finding water.

Here is a screen shot of the user tags of the Expanded Dune Novel Winds of Dune:

Is this fair? I plan on going through, step by step, what I feel are legitimate complaints of the Expanded Dune series.

I Are Dune Blog

I am perhaps too pre-occupied with Frank Herbert's sci-fi saga Dune. As of a few days ago I finished reading all 16 published Dune novels in chronological order, and decided to start a blog to share some thoughts.