Heretics of Dune (Dune #5)[May 10, 2024]

[Yanique, Thread Master]

This is a Buddy Read for Heretics of Dune by Frank Herbert starting on May 10, 2024.


Happy Reading!

[Choko]

Thank you, Yanique!

[Nirkatze]

Thank you!

Schedule:
1. Dune (Jan 10) [link]
2. Dune Messiah (Feb 10) [link]
3. Children of Dune (Mar 10) [link]
4. God Emperor of Dune (Apr 10) [link]
5. Heretics of Dune (May 10)
6. Chapterhouse: Dune (Jun 10) [link]

Audio: No free/subscription copies. Check your libby!
Ebook: ditto

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Started this one too... why not?... and right from page 2, we have another Duncan Idaho golem...

Set 1500 years after God-Emperor of Dune, apparently...

[Nirkatze]

LOL How many have you started now, Iain? I was going to try to knock out Gunnie Rose first, then jump here, then over to Kushiel for the cozies... Why is torture sex cozy? Well, those parts aren't cozy. But the found family is.

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

If you include things I paused awhile ago, alot... there's Meru which I started in February/March... A Soldier's Duty (an ebook re-read I started late March)... The Mayor of Noobtown which I tried mid-April and was struggling with...

In more serious book counts, right now I've started:
Kushiel's Avatar
Heretics of Dune

Everything else I've started I've finished, but I did pause on Gunnie Rose for a day and read Gunmetal Magic...

I've been pausing alot on home books and reading different things at work lately... did similar with Mask of Mirrors and maybe Voyage of the Damned...

[Nirkatze]

Been wanting to try those earlier ones you listed...

I've got Great North Road waiting for me since February... and if I catch up to things I might give the Ravenor books a try...

Eye-reading Voyage of the Damned and enjoying it but was feeling a Toby itch so just started Sleep No More too...

[Nirkatze]

About 20% in to the book so far and finding it interesting how things have changed and stayed the same... (view spoiler)[So many things once pride of the Fremen are now forbidden on Arrakis... Bene Gesserit still pursing their vision of the future--but we don't know what that is. And a new Sisterhood arrives to contest them, which controls through sexual mastery. The weirdness starts.

Tleilaxu getting more fleshed out now--with their own pursuit of future control through face-dancers...

And two children. One on Arrakis and one child Duncan. I like the introduction of children into the story--and not weird awake ones like Leto and his sister. Just very smart children, both in very different places. (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

I didn't make too much progress, but I wonder how the seers continue to try and shape the future, despite Leto's successes at breeding humans that can't have their futures read... I'm sure there are interesting workarounds...

Also, this past week I saw a youtube short:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2eMD...

(that guy's videos always build towards a WTF moment... they're pretty funny... and also informational, if you care to try and understand how all the Zelda games are connected, or the many versions of Snake & Ocelot in the Metal Gear Solid series, or all the fucked up Vault experiments in Fallout, etc etc etc)...

[Nirkatze]

Watched the video. Alaskan Bullworm? Have not heard of this. LOL

Up to 25% and the book is also going into WTF territory. LOTS of sex being mixed into Bene Gesserit style manipulation going on with very graphic speech... stuff like "the man wouldn't even know he was trapped until his penis was firmly enclosed by the vagina."

"..."
"......"
"........."
*facepalm*

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Nirkatze wrote: "Watched the video. Alaskan Bullworm? Have not heard of this. LOL

Up to 25% and the book is also going into WTF territory. LOTS of sex being mixed into Bene Gesserit style manipulation going on wit..."

Sounds like that anti-rape condom that was invented a decade ago... like a Chinese finger trap with teeth, that the woman inserts...

Did a google, and it's called the Rape-aXe...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Nirkatze wrote: "Been wanting to try those earlier ones you listed...

I've got Great North Road waiting for me since February... and if I catch up to things I might give the Ravenor books a try...
..."

I forgot you bowed out of Ravenor++... Choko & Elizabeth really liked Ravenor... I wasn't paying enough attention to truly love it...

Ravenor is in a motorized sci-fi wheel-chair, and can pilot his friends/allies/underlings, with his psy-powers...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

If there's one thing I can say about the Dune series, the audiobooks (and maybe the ebooks/eyebooks) are eminently readable... they fly by so fast... even if you don't necessarily agree with everything Herbert philosophizes about (like Choko)... and this one definitely has some humdinger quotes :D (as evinced above with the one about sexual control)...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

I'm 2/3s through already... and all the factions are clashing together as usual...

I've been thinking a bit about the structure of the series... from what I've heard about Chapterhouse, and having read 1-4 and half of this...

Each pair of books focuses on a set of characters... the first 2 and last 2 cover a shorter period of time, I think...

The middle 2 to the start of this book covers 5000 years... 3500 yers of Leto II and 1500 years post-Leto II

(view spoiler)[The Bene Geserit can really withstand the test of time... they're the one faction that's relatively the same all the way through, so far... as other factions come and go and/or evolve... (hide spoiler)]

[Nirkatze]

That's a good point... they've survived the longest... but have also been under attack the whole time, more or less...

78% in... (view spoiler)[They've never seen a Tleilaxu female... and it's revealed... we've been in the Vorkosigan Saga the whole time, and they all use uterine replicators... it's the future of Athos! (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Forged in Fire... as it were...

[Choko]

1500 years! Goodness gracious!!!

I see the Bene Gesserit haven't changed at all...

The Tlielaxu make me very uncomfortable... You guys know my paranoia about anything that can change shape at will and take whoever form they want and replace them...!

The whole story makes me extremely uncomfortable, but it is very fascinating! I am only 15% in so haven't gotten to the more explicit parts you guys have mentioned...

[Nirkatze]

Choko wrote: "1500 years! Goodness gracious!!!

I see the Bene Gesserit haven't changed at all...

The Tlielaxu make me very uncomfortable... You guys know my paranoia about anything that can change shape at w..."

The Tlielaxu face-dancers are pretty interesting--there's a lot of potential storywise there too... since they become the people they copy both inside and out--in the end, what will win over? Their loyalty to the Tleilaxu, or the loyalties of the person they have become?

[Nirkatze]

Timelord Iain wrote: "I forgot you bowed out of Ravenor++... Choko & Elizabeth really liked Ravenor... I wasn't paying enough attention to truly love it..."

My issues with the Eisenhorn books are mainly that the narrator's voice turns my brain off. I can't focus on what he's saying and get very little out of the story--and during the school year I don't have the time to set aside to focus. I need audiobooks to get me through my work day of no-sleep without panicking, so I need things that I can follow with only half my attention--same reason I haven't finished Great North Road yet. But school is out in a week. A WEEK!!! And then hopefully I'll have both the time and attention span to spare... IF the excessive amount of BRs let me!

[Nirkatze]

Finished Heretics. Agreeing with Iain that no matter what the insane levels of depravity these books climb to, they are very readable. Gulpable, even. I enjoyed the story, mostly for the character focuses. But by gods (view spoiler)[that near ending scene with Duncan and the Honored Matria!! I clicked that 30sec+ button a LOT to get through that.

I've been trying to think what literary justification Herbert has for taking the story down such a graphically lusty path, and the best I can come up with is an exploration of the philosophy of the mind v. body, with the Bene Gesserit and Mentats and whatnot being representatives of the mind controlling the body, while the face-dancers and Matres are the body controlling the mind. The level of detail still feels egregious though, and makes me think of some of Heinlein's novels, which get a little too sexual to be comfortable as well.

I think my favorite character was Tes. It's kind of cool having an MC who's coming back out of retirement--and still finding room to grow and gain more skills. And is it just me, or is like, everyone an Atreides now? (hide spoiler)]

[Choko]

I finished too. I keep being amazed at how dense these books are! The other thing, and I believe I am in the minority here, I don't understand why so many people love Duncan in all of his reincarnations. He is supposed to be this loyal and noble in personality dude, knowledgeable and secure in his physical prowess, but every time he comes off as insecure, is always indecisive (which I can kind of forgive the newer versions of him, since once he learns he has had other lives, he starts trying to figure them out, and once he is "awakened", he gets all disoriented), but he always turns against the people he is supposed to be loyal to... The only reason he is being used over and over is as a catalyst to the situation he is being dropped in, and it works, but only if we accept him as this tool for change, and not as a man in himself.

(view spoiler)[ The Tielaxu are fascinating and it is kind of funny that they turn out to be the biggest zealots of The Divided G-d! And are using a theological thesis written by a Bene Gesserit sister to destabilize the current church status quo. I am really interested to see where the author goes with them.

Fascinating also, as Nirkadze said, that we are actually in a Vorkosigan Saga world and they are using uterine replicators for their reproductive practices... They have genetically really veered from the typical Human genome... Is this why they want the BG's breeding gene files, so they could veere back to the main, on top of getting some of the best human gene manipulation could offer? And of course, bring them closer to their Prophet, who comes from the Atreaties line?

Speaking of, apparently the BG's have done a great job doubling up on genetic variations of that line and almost everyone we are dealing with at this moment is somehow related.

So, the Matres are derivative from the Fisher Speakers that were loyal to Leto, and once he dissolved himself into those precursor creatures to the Worms, they split and left the planet. Now they are coming back, after 1500 years, and are wanting to rule, but their main weapon is force - either with sex or weapons, while the Bene Gesserit are still in good physical shape, but their strengths are in manipulation, subtlety, and knowledge... Is it wrong of me to root for the BG's? I know I am supposed to mistrust and possibly dislike them, but they are the only side I find myself rooting for!!! I want them to survive, although by the end of the book, I was thinking that they will have to continue making some unholy alliances with people they don't like in order to stay alive and relevant. I have no idea what is going to happen with their new and very questionable alliance with the Tlielaxu, but I am thinking, having Duncan sleeping with that annoying Matre and getting her pregnant at the end, will probably lead to the Matres and BG's eventually having to work together, even if they don't trust each other... I am absolutely fascinated by all the unknowns and possibilities!!!

I didn't like the young girl who could communicate with The Worms while she was on the planet, but once she got a stronger adult personality around her, she became much more tolerable... I want to see what she does from now on, since they took a worm to cultivate on the next planet... Which, by the way, leads me to the fact that I didn't expect them to leave to begin with.. (hide spoiler)]

This series is insane! I am glued to it though!

[Choko]

It's not just you, everyone IS an Atreides now!

[Nirkatze]

Speaking of the Sisterhood...

https://winteriscoming.net/posts/the-...

[Nirkatze]

Choko wrote: "I finished too. I keep being amazed at how dense these books are! The other thing, and I believe I am in the minority here, I don't understand why so many people love Duncan in all of his reincarna..."

Really enjoyed your comments, Choko! Especially the idea of Idaho being a catalyst for change... that seems very on point... (view spoiler)[and you're not at all alone rooting for the Bene Gesserit... And the next book is named "Chapterhouse: Dune" so we'll very much get to see that next step... (hide spoiler)]

[Choko]

Thank you for making me feel like I am not insane! I mean, I am, just as much as anyone, but I am not one of those people who loves to root for the bad guys, and I couldn't understand why they are the only ones I want to succeed!

[Choko]

Thank you for making me feel like I am not insane! I mean, I am, just as much as anyone, but I am not one of those people who loves to root for the bad guys, and I couldn't understand why they are the only ones I want to succeed!

[Choko]

Thank you for making me feel like I am not insane! I mean, I am, just as much as anyone, but I am not one of those people who loves to root for the bad guys, and I couldn't understand why they are the only ones I want to succeed!

[Nirkatze]

Yeah, I think the BGs definitely come across as the people to root for by this time... especially when the other sides are the Tleilaxu and the Matres, who are both batshit crazy...

I keep thinking about why it is that the egregious sex scenes in this book and the next one bother me... (view spoiler)[I mean, I'm not a fan of sex in books in general, but I've read much steamier books without batting an eye, and there's something about the scenes in this book that make me think of an old man leering. And I think it's because the first four books have almost no sex in them, so when the really graphic scenes show up in this one, it's like getting slapped in the face with a dick. Get that out of my face!! (hide spoiler)]

[Choko]

HAHAHA!!!! You almost made me spit my coffee all over myself!!!! Hahaha!

Exactly! The sex is very short, but I think what makes it weird is that it feels illicit and forced, because neither side is doing it from a place of love, like or lust. They are there for power, control and proving a point, which in our sensibilities is more akin to rape on the extreme side, and dirty and unpleasant work on the more palatable side....

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

But if there was a crate involved, you guys would love it ;)

(Swordheart reference)

[Choko]

Haha! That might make things more interesting:)))

[Nirkatze]

Timelord Iain wrote: "But if there was a crate involved, you guys would love it ;)

(Swordheart reference)"

On this note, and tagging off of what Choko said--there was no love, or lust, or even humor in these scenes! The humor is what made the Swordheart scene so good, and there was a lot of lust and love throughout too. That book has readers clamoring for more dicks! This one was like... put it away! It's all power play in this book... like Choko said again, and that makes it feel more like rape than anything else...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

I was joking, more than anything... I agree with what you guys said about this book/series vs that one...

[Nirkatze]

Timelord Iain wrote: "I was joking, more than anything... I agree with what you guys said about this book/series vs that one..."

Don't worry, I got you were joking! It just made me think serious thoughts too...