Jᴀᴄᴜʀᴜᴛᴜ - Tʜᴇ Cᴀsᴛ Oᴜᴛ

Leave it to you to see a similarity like that!


(How's the weather over there right now? I heard the sun has actually come out? )

Didn't Frank Herbert's name used to be at the top of Dune books?

Now the publishers have gotten locked into the idea that the authors' names are an embarrassment and all books sell if you write DUNE big enough.

I still hold that the cover changes were meant to hide the author names and suggest a change.

Have I read PoD? Yes. I just finished it. After Sandworms I was so angry I swore never to read PoD......but that was a year ago and I was weak, WEAK!!!! Forgive me.....And now I swear I will never read Winds of Dune. Really.

Once again, I was not impressed. There WILL be spoilers. Let's go:

- The two alternating timeperiods structure did not work for me. It made me stop reading after I finished one of the periods.
- The stories themselves were not that interesting. I found myself counting the pages I had to read until the next 'chapter'. a bad sign.
- Stealing a lot of plot points from Dune Messiah (foreshadowing Korba's treachery is just one example), removing the surprise in Dune: Messiah.

And now for the really annoying things:

- Paul fighting alongside his troops in the Jihad? No way! And Paul back on Caladan? Maybe, but I got the impression from Dune that he would have to live on Arrakis forever, because of the total spice-addiction.

- After the assassins try to kill young Paul on Caladan, Duke Leto thinks to himself: "They tried to murder my son!!!". OMG, This totally ruins the assassination attempt in DUNE....!!!: Duke Leto thinks the very same line in DUNE when the hunter-seeker attacks Paul . Why would Leto be so shocked in DUNE, if it was already tried once beforce, here in PoD?

- Paul is constantly brooding over his 'terrible destiny' over and over and OVER and OVER. YES WE KNOW already!!! sheeshhh.

- Irulan pointing out every other page that her biographies are myths and not an accurate portrayal of Paul's real life. Paul was born on Kaitain you know.

- The Grumman attack on the monastery on Caladan. How did those Grumman planes even get that close? Doesn't Caladan have planetary defences? Nobody else seemed to have noticed them? Highly improbable.

- Why was Shaddam in this book? He served no purpose. The only thing he did was ordering the death of that poor Dalak fellow. Wensicia is reduced to a murdering bitch who carries out the execution. Psychopath style, like every other character in these prequels.

- In DUNE Pauls move to Arrakis was his first off-world trip. Here he travels to Ecaz AND Grumman. Inconsistencies blamed on Irulans writing. Yeah right.
But when you read about these trips, he actually did NOTHING of consequence. On Ecaz he walks into a meeting and promptly gets thrown out again. Why he needed to be there I still don't know. And on Grumman he joins the Atreides attack-forces (yes, a 12 year old heir of a duke), only to get thrown out when the fighting gets tough. Why violating canon when it serves no purpose??? Bad writing!

- That Bludd character. This whole insane murderplot, only to become famous? Totally unrealistic. I don't buy it. Bad, bad, bad!

- Rabban gets to lead the attack against the Atreides on Grumman? Why? I thought the Harkonnen involvement was supposed to be a secret. Of course some Atreides would recognize him. Idiots.

- The now all too familiar disgusting descriptions of violence and gore. It is almost as if these writers love to describe how "thick blood squirts from raw wounds and how heads fall graciously from the bloody stump on her still convulsing corpse." or something like that.

- Irulan gets an unexpected visit from a couple of Bene Gesseritts in the Citadel. How did these witches infiltrate the Muad'dibs Royal Palace without anybody noticing it. Are there no guards upon guards upon guards? Must be their 'magic' powers.

- When Fenring lands in Arrakeen, the first thing he does is murder a guard... WHY? Why would he do that when he wants to kill Paul later on? Why risk imprisonement? He comes across as an incompetent psychopath.

- Poor Bludd gets sentenced to death, but this dangerous Fenring psychopath may live. Ok, why? Because he is Pauls fellow 'Kwizatz Haderach? I get it. Actually, no.

- At the end of this book Irulan seems content in her role as the emperor's platonic wife. WTF? In Messiah she was practically begging to bear his child.

That's enough. I can't wait to read Winds of Dune. Or Maybe I can.

dunaddict wrote:And now I swear I will never read Winds of Dune. Really.
...
I can't wait to read Winds of Dune.

Damn ... you're fickler even than I am!


I can't remember if anyone has mentioned the spice-addiction aspect of Paul leaving Arrakis, but it would have been an issue for any of the Fremen who went off to the Jihad. (Though to a lesser degree than for Paul or a BG RM, of course.)

Paul of Dune ... thanks for reminding me of this stinker.

I saved you the effort on reading Winds. Just check out (and add to) my WOD notes thread. Its my small repayment for that blessed soul who put up the Hunters/Sadworms synopsis on wikipedia.

DEATH TO MARIE FENRING AND THE MINDSET THAT BORE HER

Thanks Amp. I'm reading it now. It is unbelievable that even after 11 books, their writing skills just.. do.. not.. improve.
Most of the time their ideas are either poor copies of similar scenes in DUNE, or awkward tales that fail to capture the spirit of DUNE. That, or mindless gorefests and explosions of violence by moronic psychopaths who fail to resemble their former selves in the original Dune novels.

Oh, and I just remembered something else in PoD that struck me as odd. Alia punishes some con-men by predicting the outcome of their fixed dice.
...Wait a minute, was Alia prescient? In Dune:Messiah she only had flashes in her spice trance. But predicting the outcome of a dice-roll just like that, again and again???? That's Muad'dib territory.

Also, whenever Thufir is mentioned, there is a 95% chance that Duncan and Gurney are mentioned in the same sentence. It got so bad that I began anticipating it and I was right most of the time.

dunaddict wrote:Thanks Amp. I'm reading it now. It is unbelievable that even after 11 books, their writing skills just.. do.. not.. improve.
Most of the time their ideas are either poor copies of similar scenes in DUNE, or awkward tales that fail to capture the spirit of DUNE. That, or mindless gorefests and explosions of violence by moronic psychopaths who fail to resemble their former selves in the original Dune novels.

Oh, and I just remembered something else in PoD that struck me as odd. Alia punishes some con-men by predicting the outcome of their fixed dice.
...Wait a minute, was Alia prescient? In Dune:Messiah she only had flashes in her spice trance. But predicting the outcome of a dice-roll just like that, again and again???? That's Muad'dib territory.

Also, whenever Thufir is mentioned, there is a 95% chance that Duncan and Gurney are mentioned in the same sentence. It got so bad that I began anticipating it and I was right most of the time.

No only did their writing skills not improve, they have degenerated from the House trilogy. I dread what the next book or trilogy will be like.

dunaddict wrote:...Wait a minute, was Alia prescient? In Dune:Messiah she only had flashes in her spice trance. But predicting the outcome of a dice-roll just like that, again and again???? That's Muad'dib territory.

Yes she was. Like Paul's, her prescience was clouded by the Dune Tarot and other factors. What I think confuses people on this issue is that Alia was trying to see the identity of her future baby-dady, not trying to overcome a general block on her prescience. Here I see two possibilities, both of which were in a possible future that never came to be; the father would be Paul in a forced mating to appease the BG/Guild/BT cabal in which case she would never be able to see the father because of his own powerfull prescience shielding him and Hayt (the more likely, as her husband) who was shielded by Edric as a weapon of the cabal.

She was? Must have forgotten that. I will pay more attention when I re-read Children of Dune. First I have to finish 'the Etched City' by K.J.Bishop. After that PoD abomination, it's a relief to read about characters who have thoughts deeper than a 5-year old again.

Didn't Paul tell Hayt that he suspected he had a small amount of prescience as well, enough to cloud himself? I know they felt that way about Bijaz.

Hi, newbie here.

Just thought I'd say that I'm shocked they would actually have the gall to "de-canonize" and "delegitimize" the original Dune novel. How could they actually do that to Frank Herbert?

If you've read Sandworms, you already know how far they will plunge Dune into the abyss.

HBJ

Krazy Kwisatz wrote:Hi, newbie here.

Just thought I'd say that I'm shocked they would actually have the gall to "de-canonize" and "delegitimize" the original Dune novel. How could they actually do that to Frank Herbert?

Brian's dead-drunk most of the time, has this love/hate/intimidation thing going with his father,
and doesn't really read what Keith "writes", just signs the checks ....

Keith is a full-blown megalomaniac with a limited IQ, inadequacy issues he combs-over with
delusions of grandeur, and a legitimate misunderstanding of "literature"; he has very limited
original creative imagination, and so re-writes everything as another StarWars comic book;
he's the nerdy fat kid who thinks that all the people making fun of him are just jealous ....

Bryon Merritt is a clueless asshole and shameless sycophant, and the rest of the Living Herberts are Parasites ....

SandRider wrote:

Krazy Kwisatz wrote:Hi, newbie here.

Just thought I'd say that I'm shocked they would actually have the gall to "de-canonize" and "delegitimize" the original Dune novel. How could they actually do that to Frank Herbert?

Brian's dead-drunk most of the time, has this love/hate/intimidation thing going with his father,
and doesn't really read what Keith "writes", just signs the checks ....

Keith is a full-blown megalomaniac with a limited IQ, inadequacy issues he combs-over with
delusions of grandeur, and a legitimate misunderstanding of "literature"; he has very limited
original creative imagination, and so re-writes everything as another StarWars comic book;
he's the nerdy fat kid who thinks that all the people making fun of him are just jealous ....

Bryon Merritt is a clueless asshole and shameless sycophant, and the rest of the Living Herberts are Parasites ....

Other words, a pussy.

Mr. Teg wrote:

SandRider wrote:

Krazy Kwisatz wrote:Hi, newbie here.

Just thought I'd say that I'm shocked they would actually have the gall to "de-canonize" and "delegitimize" the original Dune novel. How could they actually do that to Frank Herbert?

Brian's dead-drunk most of the time, has this love/hate/intimidation thing going with his father,
and doesn't really read what Keith "writes", just signs the checks ....

Keith is a full-blown megalomaniac with a limited IQ, inadequacy issues he combs-over with
delusions of grandeur, and a legitimate misunderstanding of "literature"; he has very limited
original creative imagination, and so re-writes everything as another StarWars comic book;
he's the nerdy fat kid who thinks that all the people making fun of him are just jealous ....

Bryon Merritt is a clueless asshole and shameless sycophant, and the rest of the Living Herberts are Parasites ....

Other words, a pussy.

Man you hate that guy, I bet if I looked through your posts at least half of them would be you just popping in to call him a pussy whenever someone mentions his name!

freakin' meow .....

I'm just saying...

Just trawling through amazon.co.uk and found this



Is this a genuine cover, or just amazon playing silly buggers again?

Sev wrote:Just trawling through amazon.co.uk and found this



Is this a genuine cover, or just amazon playing silly buggers again?

Covers like that are usually for ARCs, or maybe for downloadable recordings (or other inchoate products), or possibly papers and such by Gale that are about the work. Can't see the link, so can't figure it out.

Sev wrote:Is this a genuine cover, or just amazon playing silly buggers again?

No, it shows up in the U.S. store, too, as the top result for the mass market paperback:

http://tinyurl.com/yh77fwc" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Holy mentats ... it's just awful. Not even the HLP would approve such a thing, right? It must be the Kindle cover or something.

Keith couldn't've approved that ...

the yellow text against the white background makes his name almost unreadable ...

just glancing at it, you see "Brian Herbert and some other guy" ...
s'pposed to be t'other way around ....

It would be even better if that cover were printed and shipped upside down.

Disgusting "covert-art". How people are supposed to WANT to buy the mass-market paperback if it's not attractive ? Even textbooks back in the '80s were more good-looking than this thing...