Frank Herbert: The Dune - part I review

I had just finished watching The Dune miniseries (in three parts), so it was good time to read the books as I had so many recommendations of them.

Herbert's book The Dune is the first part of the series (also The Dune), which situates in a desert planet Arrakis. The Atreides family is taking over planet's government after the reign of the Harkonnen, the family of which people generally don't like very much.
The Duke Atreides, his son Paul and Paul's mother Jessica, who's part of the special Bene Gesserit group ("the witch women" as some people call them) move to the planet to get to know the place, organize new ways and start to dig up the most important export of the dry planet, the spice.
But the Harkonnen family isn't slightly giving the planet up and soon the Atreides' realise that they have been deceived by someone they trust...

Even though Herbert's book is written in the 1960's, it still doesn't seem old. The good sci-fi is just like this: it doesn't age. The planet Arrakis is believable and all its technology suits the story perfectly.
The whole book is still somewhat a prequel on the real events that start from the next book. But the first part is a good introduction to a world of sand and dryness, where water is treated the most precious thing in the world.

I can suggest this to anyone who enjoys good science fiction and to those who haven't read much of it. It's a good book to start with. Not too much "technology fetisism" as I call it.

Oh, and the Harkonnen family is the very same family H. R. Giger designed his famous Harkonnen chairs to.

/ [Caterin S.]

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