Dune

Okay, I don't know if Frank Herbert's original is the best place to start or if a significant amount of backstory is covered in the other books that I should know first.

Due to the presence of Kevin J. Anderson in writing Frank Herbert's son's extensions of the original series, you just can't compare them.  If you read the father's series first, and like it, then you'll enjoy the extended series for the "Dune universe", but I can almost guarantee that you'll hate what that hack Anderson did to it.

SPOILER ALERT!  SPOILERS FOLLOW!





















The Dune universe as published by the father only covered about 6000 to 8000 years of time, from the era of Muad'dib (Paul Atreides), down to the continuance of the Atreides line through people like Miles Teg, Darwi Odrade, and Sheeana ... as well as the ancient cells of the Atreides remaining in the possession of the last Tleilaxu.

HOWEVER, Anderson's hackery with Frank's son produced another, enveloping storyline, based upon a singular entity (i.e. that old "Dark Lord" meme that hack authors love to rely on) called Omnius (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omnius), against which the Butlerian Jihad was allegedly waged.  Herbert's son claims that Omnius is based upon his father's notes, but the entire concept from soup to nuts is so filled with hack that it actually seems to be a creation of Anderson (who as I've pointed out, IS a hack).  Anderson managed to start the early Dune books based upon this Omnius crap, and then managed to bring it back to be the Big Bad Guy for the next book following where Frank left off (in "Chapterhouse: Dune").  Omnius Omnius Omnius -- fuck, Kevin J. Anderson has got fucking Omnius ON THE BRAIN!

Look, just do yourself a favor, and stick to the "class Dune", to wit:

http://www.dunenovels.com/classic.html

So I guess "Sandworms of Dune" is crap, then?

>>3
SoD must be the new one.  {googles}  Yep.  In the previous, Anderson was trying to not only bring back all the major characters of Frank's era, and also involve his Omnius crap.  I haven't read SoD, but I shudder to think of what other contrivance that Anderson will come up with.  I then googled and found:

http://www.amazon.com/Sandworms-Dune-Brian-Herbert/dp/076531293X

... and started literally gagging.  Marine sandworms?  Kwisatz Haderach vs. Omnius?  Oh, dear lordy.  One review probably summed it up for us:

"The lengthy climax relies on at least four consecutive deus ex machina bailouts, eventually devolving into sheer fairy tale optimism."

Herbert's son should have had his head examined for ever letting a hack author like Anderson anywhere NEAR the Dune universe.

djh

the original Dune is pretty shit. i was disappointed

I personally don't like what he's doing to the Dune universe, but I do like his Sevens Suns books

So anything written by Herbet's son himself is still okay, but Mr. Anderson...feels like "The Crystal Star" from the Expanded Universe of Star Wars?