Heretics of Dune

Don’t be disappointed by the unresolved ending of Heretic of Dune. This is a bridge novel. Appreciate the expectant storyline of The Charter House of Dune, the recent planet of the Sisterhood of the Bene Generit. There is much development in Heretics, new characters are evenly portrayed. The writing is vivid that encompasses a keen energy. The plot’s tempo is unlike the prior book in the series. The suspense moves evenly with surprises unanticipated. This is still a compelling and intriguing story.

In Heretics of Dune, Frank Herbert takes us fifteen hundred years after the previous book and well over four thousand years beyond the original trilogy. The God Emperor is gone, the Atreides clan has faded from its former prominence, and, as always, there are a number of groups struggling for dominance.With so many specialized types of humans and prolonged lifespans, it is not overly surprising that civilization has not undergone any truly drastic changes since Leto II's transformation. This book focuses on the Bene Gesserit, the sisterhood who have grand designs for humanity. Among others jockeying for power are the Tleilaxu who have mastered biology in other fashions. More dangerous still are the Honored Matres, a powerful organization that is a dark doppleganger of the Bene Gesserit.Of course, there is another Duncan Idaho who is a pawn in all this scheming, but the most interesting characters are Miles Teg - a master warrior called out of retirement to mentor Duncan - and Sheeanna, a young girl who can command the sand worms of Rakis (the former Arrakis). Sheanna is probably the most refreshing character this series has had in a while; she behaves like a real child, and isn't a grand schemer unlike every other character.This is still good science fiction. Dune/Rakis/Arrakis is not as central as in previous books, and the role of sex is much more important, at times even overshadowing the spice. At first, the story is a bit disorienting - there are no familiar characters until Duncan appears - but things pick up quickly enough. All the Dune books conclude with a new order imposed on the galaxy and this book is no exception. What that new order is, however, is for the reader to find out.The Dune series is not always easy to read, but it is a complex and worthwhile classic of science fiction. For those who have enjoyed the previous books, this book will continue the pleasure.

At the time I'm writing this review I'm in the middle of my 12th reading of the whole Dune saga so I guess you can accuse me of being a hard core addicted Frank Herbert fan, which explains why I chose my public reviewer name as "Biased-Insight".In short, "Heretics of Dune" is one of the less "important" episodes of the DUNE saga but make no mistake, this is still Science Fiction entertainment at its highest level; sometimes (rarely) equaled and so far not yet surpassed. If I were to rate my favorite SF sagas in order of importance, the absolute winner is Frank Herbert's original Dune titles, closely followed on second place by both The Saga Of Seven Suns by Kevin J Anderson and Tolkien's Lord Of The Rings; this in turn closely followed on third by Peter F. Hamilton's Void Trilogy as well as Night's Dawn Trilogy, heavens, don't even get me started on "Great North Road", and the whole Dan Simmons and David Brin lists of titles. Yes, well, you are a science fiction reader or you aren't, there is no half measure possible here.I am planning on returning to all the works mentioned for another read some day, but I have to finish "Heretics Of Dune" first, and only after "Chapter House Dune" would it become a remote possibility; that is if I don't pick up DUNE once more, as that would only be the thirteenth time.Jules Verne turned out to be a prophetic writer, his "Nautilus" announcing the era of submarines. Frank Herbert is prophesying on the topic of current "modern" religions and ecology; but you have to be able to read between the lines. Once you do, you might, just like I did, read the whole series of books he wrote to discover layer upon layer, upon layer...and here I am wondering if the tally will ever end. I'll keep you in the loop.

Heretics of Dune is further proof that my fifteen year old self was not equipped with the receptivity that the latter Dune books require. Beyond the fact that I remembered very little of it, reading it now is an entirely different, and far more rewarding, experience. For many years I fed off the collective opinion of these latter books, as well as my earlier reading of it, and decided they may not be worth the time. I halted my every whim to return to them. This was a mistake. No, Heretics is not Dune. It's not Dune: Messiah. It's not even God Emperor, but it is one hell of a science-fiction novel. And for mega fans of the series (I will admit to being such) it is more than worthwhile.Heretics takes place some 1,500 years after the brunt of what we read in God Emperor of Dune, and right out of the gate Herbert hits you with a boatload of tantalizing worldbuilding. This is not the universe we knew when Leto ruled, though his shadow hangs over it still... Lost Ones have begun returning from The Scattering of humankind. With this unknown factor of evolution yet to play their cards, the other forces of the universe are on edge. The Tleilaxu here feature their most prominent role in the series thus far, and we take a much deeper look at the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood (especially as they compare to the new thread of the Honored Matres). We round out our main story bits with Miles Teg, the Sisterhood's most reliable weapon, a fresh Duncan Idaho ghola, and Sheeana, a young girl on Rakis with the ability to control the sandworm Shai-hulud (or is it Shaitan...?).In true Frank Herbert fashion, the plot is dense and full of complexities that leave me desiring to start from the beginning as soon as I finish. There is always a feeling of more lying just beneath the surface; a feeling I love. He remains a master at mixing a far-future setting with Eastern mysticism and metaphysical psychedelia. The result is perhaps one of the most believable science-fiction worlds out there, and I think this stems from how seriously Frank takes his work. It is amazing how much thought, how many hidden questions and subtle answers he is still injecting into this story.The Dune universe has a depth and richness that marks Herbert's worldbuilding skills as matched by perhaps only Tolkien himself. The story of Arrakis and the peoples of its universe is one that is endlessly fascinating and complex. In a story that spans millennia, I think back on previous books with a sense of nostalgia bordering on awe; and experience the current story with the sense that there is always more to be revealed. Considering how much I enjoyed God Emperor and Heretics, I am very much looking forward to Chapterhouse after all these years.--------------"We are not looking at a new state of matter but at a newly recognized relationship between consciousness and matter, which provides a more penetrating insight into the workings of prescience. The oracle shapes a projected inner universe to produce new external probabilities out of forces that are not understood. There is no need to understand these forces before using them to shape the physical universe. Ancient metal workers had no need to understand the molecular and submolecular complexities of their steel, bronze, copper, gold, and tin. They invented mystical powers to describe the unknown while they continued to operate their forges and wield their hammers."

In Heretics of Dune, nearly 1500 years have past since Leto II's (The God Emperor) reign ended. Humanity is finally on the Golden Path that Leto II sacrificed so much for with most importantly, his humanity. Shortly after Leto II's death, his tyrannical reign began to weaken and a great many of humanity went out into the Scattering in search of populating several other planets and spreading humanity out as far as humanely possible. However, not all of those in the Scattering were grateful for what Leto II did and are now coming back bent on conquering much of the galaxy that was in place in Leto's time. Major players in this book include the Bene Gesserit, Bene Tleilaxu, a new Duncan ghola, and Miles Teg.The Bene Gesserit are the only ones that still adhere to Leto II's Golden Path for humanity. They are also faced with a rather interesting choice, do they continue to manipulate humanity and continue their breeding programs? Or do they help humanity to grow and spread outward in a future where humanity will not face certain extinction? Throughout the series, I was never a big fan of the Bene Gesserit. Yet they are major players in this book and as the reader will see towards the end, they do make the right decisions for humanity and somewhat atone for their manipulative past.A great deal of this book centers around the formerly retired military hero, Bashar Miles Teg. He is called into service once again for a very important assignment - the training of a new Duncan Idaho ghola, this time from childhood. The catch? There is something very different about this ghola that the Bene Tleilaxu have modified him with and it is the job of the Bene Gesserit and Miles Teg to find out before it is too late. At first Miles Teg doesn't appear to be that central of a character and as others have said is every bit as fun and intriguing as Paul Atreides and Leto II were.Of course, we cannot leave the Bene Tleilaxu out. After all of these years, they too wish to have their ascension to universal dominance that they have been waiting for so long for. The Bene Tleilaxu are lead by the dwarven-like Waff, their Tleilaxu master. It is his job to ensure that the Tleilaxu destroy the Sisterhood and at the very least gain a monopoly on melange, thus controlling the galaxies.Many forces are at work throughout the book as the race to prepare the ghola for the Sisterhood's grand scheming clashes with enemies from the Scattering, the Sisterhood, and the mysterious Honored Matres (whorish versions of the Bene Gesserit corrupted by the scattering).An exciting book from start to finish. I'm so glad I didn't give up on Dune for good 3 years ago. I've thoroughly thoroughly enjoyed this series and now it's onward to the final book! Chapterhouse Dune :)-Travis

This is unfortunately the weakest entry into the Dune series up to this point. I have no idea how good or bad Chapterhouse Dune is going to be since I have only read the first couple chapters just now, and based on what I heard about the entries that his son wrote (both the quality of writing and how the content there doesn't even mesh at all with the universe Frank Herbert created), I will not be reading those no matter how bad of a cliffhanger Chapterhouse Dune ends on. There is no shame in being the weakest entry in a series like Dune, though, given what it's up against. I absolutely loved the first three Dune books and I can't think of anything bad to say about them. You could argue that God Emperor of Dune is a bit bloated and maybe it focuses way more on the philosophical aspects of Dune than it does on it's plot, but I still enjoyed the book and I never found it tedious or boring at any point and I would recommend anyone read it.So what about Heretics of Dune?Well, lets first start with the positives. Once again, it is beautifully written and the characters are compelling. Odrade is easily my favorite out of this book and I've enjoyed every chapter that she was in and I enjoyed her interactions with Sheeana and Sheeana herself was a great character as well and I would also say that all of her chapters were just as enjoyable. The Duncan Idaho ghola easily comes in at third. I didn't think Teg was as interesting as other people seem to think but he wasn't a bad character at all. His interactions with Duncan Idaho make him a lot more interesting and really help to elevate him above the archetype of the retired veteran forced back into active duty. The plot is interesting once it actually starts up...But then that brings us to the negatives, which would mainly be the beginning and ending of this book. I'll lay it out here without spoilers first. Basically, the first 130 pages is a choppy mess of exposition, info-dumps, and character background. The previous books always did a much better job with this, so I'm not really sure what the problem was here. And then the ending was just a choppy mess. Had the beginning been trimmed and edited a little, and had the ending been expanded upon, this would have been a much better book.I can't get into my problems in detail with the ending without spoilers, so if you haven't read at least the first five Dune books, skip this paragraph. You have been warned. So anyway, onward with spoilers. Basically, in the last few chapters, Teg gathers all of his old war buddies together and they agree to help him and he says he needs to steal a no-ship. And in the next chapter he has that no-ship and he is with Lucilla and Duncan and they're heading back to Arrakis. It would've been nice to have gotten a chapter of them stealing that no-ship, and then we get another chapter where he reunites with Lucilla and Duncan. I mean, okay, I get that the book was maybe getting a bit too long and everything and maybe it was felt that how he got the no-ship wasn't nearly as interesting as what came after, and...I guess that's fine if Frank Herbert felt that way. But that's not even the worst of it. The worst is that Arrakis gets destroyed and it felt so abrupt to me and we didn't even get to see it. He just goes to Arrakis, gets the worm, gathers Sheeana and Odrade, and they leave and the next chapter Arrakis is destroyed. It would've been like if in God Emperor of Dune, we didn't get to see Leto II die, but instead just had the last chapter of Siona telling everyone that through an assassination attempt, Leto II fell into a river and melted in there. Paul Attreides/The Preacher was the most important character in this whole series, and in book 3, he may not have gotten the best death scene ever written in any book, but at least we got to see it happen. But nope, Arrakis just blows up off screen and Teg stays behind while it blows up. He's not the best character in the Dune series, but he was still important in this book and I still liked him and would have wanted to see his death. Given that most of this series is told from an omniscient point of view, giving him a chapter where we see his epic sacrifice would have been easy. In the first Dune we even got a chapter of Liet Kynes dying in the desert and arguing with a hallucination of his father. So what's the problem here?So is Heretics of Dune worth reading or should you stop at God Emperor of Dune, since you get closure with God Emperor and you don't get it at all with the subsequent books? That's a tough call to make. A lot of this book does seem like buildup to the next installment, so whether it's worth reading (and whether I'd read it again if I ever revisit the Dune books) is going to depend heavily on how good the content of Chapterhouse Dune is despite the lack of any resolution.Lastly, this review is based on the Kindle version, as I own all 6 Dune books on my Kindle. I had no issues with the formatting of any of the Dune books the way other people seem to have. The excerpts at the beginning of the chapters were formatted best in Dune and God Emperor of Dune, but the excerpts are in a serviceable format in the other 4 books. My only complaint would be that Children of Dune forces a smaller font, at least it did for me, and I don't know why. And the first Dune book, you have no way of determining how long the chapter is before you read it (and the page numbering for it is probably messed up too). But aside from those issues, if you own a Kindle and you want to read these books on it, I'd say go for it.

Following the 3rd novel this is a post-tyranny novel where the tyranny under Leto II Atreides whom by the standards of the emerging powers of this novel was a mundane humane utopia albeit traumatizing ingraining the whole of humanity in the Golden Path to never find itself in a situation where it can be caught in a web of extinction.From the beginning the political powers here are held between the Old Empire's remnants Bene Gesserit and Bene Tleilax who have now become central powers in their own methodical ways emerging from the background of millennials of minimal importance and then the Lost Ones returning from the Scattering. The tamed powers of what is left of Great and Minor Houses are held together by mild methodologies of economics such as CHOAM, the banking planet of Gammu and the marionettes IX-Fishspeaker Alliance. Space battles are back and are implied, but expect the Frank Herbert on them, "they fought these are the consequences." Individual characters carry the plot now.

This is book five in the Dune series. It takes place a few millennia after the events in book four. This book is more action based than the previous one. Dune now called Rakis, it has returned to being a desert planet due to the re-emergence of the sandtrout, an organism critical to the development of sandworms, because Dune's most famous lifeform is no longer extinct, the return of the all-important spice to the planet.The empire fell into chaos before the return of the sandworms, due to the scarcity of spice. This created the "Scattering" in which much of the population sought the extreme edges of the universe to find other sources of spice or to expand the location of humanity. As the book opens, many people have returned but the exodus had changed them. There is also a new force to deal with in the guise of the Honored Matres. They are very similar to the Bene Gesserit but the Matres use sex as a weapon and force of rule.Duncan Idaho was the swordmaster of Duke Leto centuries earlier. As if raising him from the dead, the Bene Gesserit have been using gholas, or clones, of Duncan through the years. But the Tleilaxu, a race which creates gholas, have always assassinated the Duncan Idaho gholas before they reach full adulthood. However,the Bene Gesserit now have an elaborate plan in place to protect the most recent reincarnation of their ghola.In the meantime, on Rakis, a child is discovered by the priests that can control the sandworms. The Bene Gesserit hear of this and immediately take over Rakis in the hopes of controlling the young girl. The Honored Matres also find this out and seek to destroy the ghola and the girl and Rakis. Needless to say, this is the setup for battles to be fought and destinies to be determined. Many entangled plots resolve into an outcome that makes this book yet another great adventure in the Duneverse created by Frank Herbert.

Was hesitant about the last two books but seeing all these familiars come back for one insane battle royal was pretty heart warming.

Turns out the one you're currently reading. Started on the "Dune" series at the end of 2018, each book just gets progressively better. After Finishing "God Emperor" I thought the series had peaked, I'm now 2/3rds of the way through "Heretics" and this one is even better. The characters of Miles Teg and Odrade are amazing, you find out how the Bene Gesserits are the ultimate bad a**es, you finally get properly introduced to the Bene Tleilax and of course get to meet the Honoured Matres........Dune, what an amazing series of books, totally blown away and I highly recommend

J'ai le sentiment que les livres s'améliorent au fur et à mesure de l'avancée dans le canon.Les hérétiques ne déçoivent pas, le bene tleilax y reçoit plus d'attention. Rejouissant et prenant.

war ein Geschenk - SUPER

Like all the Dune books Heretics is consistently good. If you like one of the Dune books, chances are you will like them all.