Dune by Frank HerbertFeb. 22/97This book all started with the family Atreides landing on plant Arrakis, commonly known as Dune. The planet Dune was the centre of the universe due to its immense amounts of spice. This spice is greatly needed for all planets as fuel and for raw materials.
The family Atreides were asked by Emperor himself to go and mine the spice on the planet. Their greatest enemy the Harkonnen’s, were also on Dune. These two families mining the precious spice on the same plant would lead to great troubles and wars. Soon after that, I was introduced to a very brave and insightful young man.
The young man is Paul Atreides. Paul is medium height with short, black hair. His mother Jessica is a Bene Gesserit that means she knows the weirding way. This means Jessica is trained to kill and is also trained as a mind reader.
She is very tall and beautiful and is always concerned with the actions of Paul, the future ruler of the galaxy. Jessica’s teacher, the Reverend Mother heard of Paul and thought that he might be the great leader that the prophets told of. The Reverend Mother came to Dune and tested Paul to see if this was so. Paul underwent great pain and suffering but passed the tests with the highest reverence.
Duke Leto, Paul’s father now came into the picture. He was the leader of the Atreides Family. He seemed very established and perceptive. The Atreides family represented good and honesty while their enemies, the Harkonnen’s, were ruthless killers. The Harkonnen home planet, Gedi Prime was very desolate and dark. It represented the immorality and darkness within the Harkonnens.
Their leader Baron Vladimir Harkonnen was very obese and inhuman. He killed his own slaves for fun and hated the Atreides with a passion. He hated their peaceful and honest ways. Most of all he despised their coming to Dune. This Harkonnen leader appeared the typical tyrant leader.
Vladimir Harkonnens most trusted solider Feyd-Rautha was also like him except his physical appearance was that of ideal shape and form. Back at the Atreides base more characters are introduced to me. They are Duncan Idaho who was the personal trainer for Paul Atreides, Dr. Yeuh who was a good friend of the Duke and later was found out to be a traitor, and Thufir Hawat the security officer of the base. All these men seemed greatly trusted in the Atreides family.
They taught Paul much about fighting and protecting himself from his enemies. These men along with Pauls mother and father helped prepare him for the coming hardships ahead. A group of people named the Fremen also were presented. They were people who lived in the desert within the forbidden zone.
The forbidden zone was where no one would ever travel. It was said that there are huge masses of Fremen there along with giant sandworms reaching a length of four hundred and fifty meters. The Fremen harvested spice, lived in the cities and in underground cities. Their eyes were bright blue on blue due to the saturation of the spice which changed their colour.
The beginning of this book was very interesting and told me much about each characters background and personality. I knew there was something special about Paul and his mother right from the start just by how the author described them. The family Atreides was very strong and even feared by the Emperor himself because he knew that Paul was the prophet who was destined to stop all violence, hunger, spice mining, armies and fighting. He was to bring a new era along with his leadership.
This frightened the Emperor that forced him to act against the Atreides family. The Harkonnens seemed a bit too uninteresting and average to me. They were evil and hated all that was good. The author should of added a bit more spice to their characters. This would of made the story more enjoyable.
Otherwise, this science fiction novel is like it says on the cover, A world beyond your experience, beyond your imagination. Dune by Frank Herbert Feb. 23/97The emperor sent the Atreides to Dune for one purpose only. Their destruction. He joined forces with the
