I tried, really I did. I’ve been getting into a bad habit of late of giving up on books half way through and with Dune; I was determined to get there. But, alas, it was not meant to be. Whilst the book itself is perfectly fine, well-written and loaded with ideas that are exciting and innovative for a science fiction novel, it’s just too heavy with ideas to flow well (for me at least).
The main problem, with me at least, is that Dune reeks of a fantasy set in the future in deep space. I have general problems with fantasy and find that science fiction, a genre I’ve only recently gotten interested in thanks to the excellent The Forever War, can often times be intrinsically linked. Dune is a perfect example of this. Whilst it features a far off planet, space travel, special habitat suits and worms the size of Norway; the narrative is bogged down with quasi-religious philosophy that I found intensely hard to swallow. This itself with frustrating as there is nothing overly wrong with the book for the most part: the prose is terrific and it’s ideas are at least interesting but with endless chapters devoted to prophecies and the training of ancient arts, I just found it too much to take in, a shame as I can see why it’s been heralded as a classic.
That said, it has done little to dampen my interest in science fiction. I have just bought Ringworld and Rendezvous With Rama, which I am very excited to read. But I think I’ll delve into something a little less cerebral.
3.5/5
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