Amp's SoD Notes


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Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Ampoliros »

Okay well maybe that title is misleading, since I'm not going to do the page by page rundown of this latest "book".

Why?

1. I haven't read the previous trilogy in a long time, and unless you're going to take up a collection for my psychotherapy/legal defense fund, I'm not going to do it again.

2. Too many things in the book would require 1 to be fully understood. I'm assuming. Its hard to tell amongst all the things that can't be understood without the disclaimer "A Moron Dictated this while hiking in the thin mountain air, then edited it while watching summer blockbusters on DVD"

What I will do is keep a running commentary of my impressions, before I work on my final review.

Now to start, I'll begin with a bombshell.

This is the best Dune book they have written.


WHA? Has Amp turned traitor? GET THE HANGIN TRIPOD!

No no no my fellow cast out, let me explain.

When I say best, remember the caveat that this is still a KJA book, meaning it was still written by the most philistine hack alive. (Hey Kev, philistine means you don't hold anything sacred, not that I'm accusing you of being a biblical tribe of pirates and raiders that made their living stealing everything, including the most sacred of objects, from those who had no defense. Wait, no you'd fit right in with them.)

What I mean is that this book is not a Brian Herbert and Kevin J Anderson Dune book. This is a Brian Herbert and Kevin J Anderson and TOR's entire production/editorial staff trying to resuscitate a milked-dead cash-cow.

The first two chapters stank of a third hand (or more) overlooking the process. It felt as if Team McDune had sat down and edited, re-editied, polished and actually thought about a finished product, rather than simply letting it fall out the mouth of a hiking hack onto paper.

The font and type appear to be much smaller and more closely spaced in order to give it a more serious appearance, rather than the larger kid-friendly (less imposing) type of the other books.

EDIT: This is the best Dune book they have produced. Make more sense now?

So far the story is the same ridiculous shit we've been expecting. The anti-tech Butlerians are the bad guys, everyone still has and NEEDS computers, and the CET was a massive failure of pious idiots who just made everyone mad at religious idiots, and the Orange Catholic Bible needs massive re-editing by the Emperor. Yeah, the Emperor (well his lackeys, but King John, er I mean Emperor Salvador organized the effort). Oh, and there is a shit ton of 'clever' little addenums that are supposed to make you nod your head at how clever the authors are, but instead enrage you because its like your 5 year old nephew trying to impress you with his clever use of names like Anna Corrino (Anna Karenina) for the Emperor's sister who, yes, is having an affair in the court.

Fuck you. And guess what, I haven't even read Anna Karenina and I thought your pun was shit.

They rip-off Dune's dinner party scene, blatantly. It's so fucktardedly obvious that the only way they can save it is by having Norma Cenva pop in in her Spice tank, tell the Emperor that all that neat tech the thinking machines left behind is the only thing that will save the universe, then pop out. Bitch did that shit with her mind!

Yeah, tech and god will save the universe, and everyone knows the navigators are mutated and doesn't give a fuck. Especially the Sisterhood, WHO WON'T FORGET.

Gilbertus looks exactly like a college professor. Write down the most stereotypical college professor you can think of. You just described him. Not kidding, you haven't read the book and you can picture him in your head. He also has Erasmus' brain core hidden away so no one will know he has it, even though he has permission from the Butlerians to have thinking machine tech for training mentats and has it lying around everywhere. But no, this one specific core he can't let anyone know he has, so much so that its in a hidden safe, inside his hidden safe. If he left it on his desk, no one would even notice he had it, or care.

Basically, we have mentats thanks to Erasmus, is what they are telling us.

So many things are nuances that Frank would just tell you were true, rather than wink wink nudge nudge you to death then act like it was some super-awesome plot that you could never have figured out. Like that the spice harvesters best native agent is a Fremen. Or that the guy in charge of security was the one who called in a fake bomb threat to the Landsraad when the Butlerians were getting all idiot pious and demanding they vote on wither the Landsraad thought the machines were evil. Or that the evolutionary sidekick of the Worms of Arrakiss (Which haven't been mentioned yet even with all the talk about spice harvesting...) will more than likely be the source of the poison which the Sisterhood uses to become RM's

Oh, and Venholdport whatever, has to deal with smugglers tapping into his spice business. But as far as I can tell the only people right now who use the spice are Ven's Navigators. So WTF would anyone else bother with it? Its as if they had the keywords SPICE and SMUGGLERS on their to-do list, but didn't bother with WHY IT MATTERS NOW TO ANYONE ELSE.

Strangely missing (so far) is the ultra-repetitiveness, which in this case might have been a good thing seeing as how so much of what we thought this book would be about, has already happened.

more to come...
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Omphalos »

Yea! He's doin' it again!
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by SadisticCynic »

Yeah, he can't complain about repetitiveness now, can he? :roll:

No, really, I'm looking forward to the high quality entertainment this thread will offer. :)

Edit: The entertainment due to Amp, of course. These kind of notes should be published; they'd sell much better than the actual novels.
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Ampoliros »

Can someone confirm/deny that spice was known for its geriatric properties by the end of the Butt-leerian Trilogy.

See what I did there? Butlerian Butt-leer-ian, cause Erasmus was checking out that dude's ass.

Yeah, that's the level of brilliance we're dealing with here.

Though yeah, wondering about how much was known about spice at this point.
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by DuneFishUK »

I don't know why you do this to yourself, but I'm glad you do. :D
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Kloud »

Ampoliros wrote: EDIT: This is the best Dune book they have produced. Make more sense now?
Yeah! Should we call'em Neveldine/Taylor, now? :lol:

However, after I'd red your interesting review I got a feeling this will be their last rape of Frank Herbert's magnum opus.
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by lotek »

I honestly think keith will never let go, it's quite obvious he's looking at Dune as his chance to become what he hates because he'll never be one, a critical darling.
Thanks for the review Amp.
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by SandChigger »

Ampoliros wrote:Can someone confirm/deny that spice was known for its geriatric properties by the end of the Butt-leerian Trilogy.
I think Venport is told of its effects by the proto-Fremen around the end of The Butlerian Jihad; he plans to market it. :roll: I forget whether he gets killed before he manages to do so...

(But The Normacle has her deification and marries him and uses her powers to keep herself attractive to him—at least, before she turns into a sea slug in a jeweled spacepod—so she at least has a supply of the spice available.... meh, details fade... Bless the Maker! :lol: )

Edit: Venport introduces the spice to Iblis Ginjo; Normacle overdoses on it and gives herself a reach-around; Vor is aware of its rejuvenating properties by The Battle of Corrin. FWIW.

(Was there something about using the spice to combat one of the Omnius plagues? Or is that from Grunters or Sadworms? :think: )
Last edited by SandChigger on 12 Jan 2012 09:19, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by SandChigger »

(By the way, shouldn't this one be SHoD, to distinguish it from Sadworms? ;) )
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Crysknife »

I don't know what the hell ya'll talkin' about. And thank god I never will.
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Ampoliros »

Pg 79 Erasmus on objectivity in historical works: wrote:"It always amuses me how a person with no firsthand knowledge of events can distort facts with such vehemence...Machines on the other hand would be at a great disadvantage if they knowingly used false data to draw conclusions."
Gilbertus, pg 80: wrote:"It serves no purpose for you to criticize the humans for their rebellion, when you yourself were the catalyst. You personally were the direct cause of the downfall of the machines."
Pg 84-85 Introduces two characters who more than likely will bear some relationship to retconning Marty and Daniel as face dancers/Erasmus & Omnius. They are flowmetal human hybrids created by the cymeks. They are evil and unstoppable, mowing down several Swordmasters.

Oh yeah, apparently Swordmasters use something called "pulse-swords". Not sure if that was something from BJ series, but a thinking person would ask, why do they just use normal swords in Dune, but they have ultra-swords in the past? Because it was written by Kevin J "sciency-fictiony" Adjective-son.

At this point we're full blown back into the repetition you'd expect. Just in case you have the attention span of a flea, the book repeats itself ad-nauseum. They needed to pad the word count, so they repeat stuff. Okay, that's a weak joke. I like levity, but I'm running a temperature what with the increased pulse rate and dilated veins in my head.

The first thing we're reminded of constantly, is how easy it would be for the Butlerians to just 'nuke it from orbit', but because they are rage-queen fanatics, they enjoy doing it by hand. So I'm assuming the pulse sword is some kind of ultra-weapon since banging on a metallic robot with a normal sword is just...stupid. However mowing down hordes of Separatist Droids with lightsabe....cymek thinking machines with pulse swords is what makes the prequels watchable...er readable.

Every single conversation Gilbertus has with Erasmus revolvs around The Professor reminding Erasmus why he can't...

You know what. I'm done. I'm not referring to him as "Erasmus" ever again.

Erasmus is this guy:
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He's a human icon like Frank. He is not and never should be a lame ass cross dressing robot from hacked fan fiction.

I need a new name for Robot-ass. taking suggestions. Nevermind, I figured it out.

Anyway, Santorum keeps saying he needs a new body, and Gil reminds him that its a bad idea. Every time.

And now we have super-flow metal people.

Now ponder this. There are several thousand people who will read this book and not know where this is going. They are easy to spot, they post the 5-star reviews on amazon and call Brian and Kevin giants of the sci-fi community.

I'll end today's little post with this nugget from page 68:

"Spacefolders could make the passage almost instantaneously..."
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Serkanner »

Ampoliros wrote:
"Spacefolders could make the passage almost instantaneously..."
Lord, protect from this .... uhm ... wah ... what on Earth do you call this?
"... the mystery of life isn't a problem to solve but a reality to experience."

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and wrote a Dune Novel."
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by SandChigger »

Shit.

It's called shit.

Fecal matter, if you want to be indirect, and more politic.

Amp, you got any inside scoop on where SHoD is going to debut on the NYT? TheKJA has been Twatting and blahgging about it, but he's not saying WHAT RANK it will debut at.

Which makes me think it's nothing worth crowing about. ;)
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

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The pulse-swords are old hack.
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Nekhrun »

Ampoliros wrote:...Anyway, Santorum keeps saying he needs a new body, and Gil reminds him that its a bad idea. Every time...
Heh, Gil.

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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Ampoliros »

Next week, the current one is the end of last year.

I'm guessing it made the list on the e-book side, not physical copies. I don't remember seeing the physical copy anywhere over 300 even on the first day. Its hovering in the 1400s now
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Rymoah »

Nekhrun wrote:
Ampoliros wrote:...Anyway, Santorum keeps saying he needs a new body, and Gil reminds him that its a bad idea. Every time...
Heh, Gil.

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Or this Gil? ;)

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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

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No, this is Gil:

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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Nekhrun »

Yes, well, they're all Gil, only mine though was pathetic enough to be associated with McDune.
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Hunchback Jack »

What is a "spacefolder"? It better not be a person.

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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

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A ship with space-folding Holzmann engines. ;)

I'm pretty sure I've used it myself, so I'm not that bothered by it. I find something like the too current-trendy VenHold company name far more offensive. (Isn't that called StudlyCaps, so something like that? :lol: )
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Ampoliros »

This book pretty much validates my claim that Hellhole was really Hellhole, the lost (or scrapped) Dune Chapters. Toronado and General Tiber are the same character with different causes. All else is adjectives.

Santorum is in full blown ADHD moron mode, turning on robots just to scare the Butlerian Mentat...Who doesn't figure anything out because this is a KJA mentat, who can use prime computation, but never does. I'm sure the way she'll discover Santorum is still alive is by sneaking into his hidden closet.

Oh, before i'm pretty sure it said he had six hidden com-eyes. Now he has them all over the place, and he's connected to them by molecule-thin lines of flowmetal. Which never seems to be a problem when Gil picks him up and carries him around the office, or puts him in the secret super-undetectable double hidden closet.
Pg149, We have Ultra-sign! wrote:"All-his vessels had ultra-secure decks that housed their mysterious navigators,..."
Venport wants the secret of Vorians life extension tech from the Suk Doctors, who at this point survive off of rampant fraud and malpractice, but dream of being legitimate. They agree to get it from his personal samples which they knowingly admit is a violation of their medical rules, but they will do it to maintain the secrecy of their history of medical rule violations. Really, it was just that one Administrator that was evil and bad, and now they have to do all this evil bad stuff to cover it up, so they can appear awesome and good.

Also, since when was the silver ring holding your hair the symbol of the Suk doctors. It was always the mark of imperial conditioning, which granted doesn't exist yet. I always considered that to be a style choice by Yueh, not an official badge. EDIT I was wrong: SEE BELOW
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

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The diamond tatoo on the forhead indicates Imperial Conditioning, the silver ring indicates a Suk School graduate.

Paul raised his head, saw the man's stick figure standing several paces
away, took in at a glance the wrinkled black clothing, the square block of a
head with purple lips and drooping mustache, the diamond tattoo of Imperial
Conditioning on his forehead, the long black hair caught in the Suk School's
silver ring at the left shoulder.

~Dune
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Ampoliros »

Freakzilla wrote:The diamond tatoo on the forhead indicates Imperial Conditioning, the silver ring indicates a Suk School graduate.

Paul raised his head, saw the man's stick figure standing several paces
away, took in at a glance the wrinkled black clothing, the square block of a
head with purple lips and drooping mustache, the diamond tattoo of Imperial
Conditioning on his forehead, the long black hair caught in the Suk School's
silver ring at the left shoulder.

~Dune
And I can admit when I was wrong. Looks like a good excuse to read the originals again. Should make a good purification ritual.
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Re: Amp's SoD Notes

Post by Freakzilla »

Just to rub your nose in it a little more... :P

The tatoo and ring seem to be used interchangably later in the book.

The way I see it, the tatoo is a permanent indicator, the ring is like a class ring.
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