Frank Herbert

V. good at dreaming up plausibly alien species (see esp. Whipping Star, which = abt non-consensual S&M between humans and STARS wot a nutcase eh!). God knows what his politics was — I suggested Ayn Rand elsewhere but that was pure guesswork, I suspect self-made anarchist libertarian — but he was def. utterly fascinated by Possible Social Machineries, and almost every book sets up a society w. a politics that ISN'T just ho-hum Western free market democracies.

To be honest I daren't go back and reread him.

Ended up reading a fair swathe of his other material as well -- Destination: Void and its cowritten sequels, The Jesus Incident (always loved that name) and The Lazarus Effect. Also read The White Plague -- freaky science apocalypse, posits an interesting question to say the least. Probably a few other books or short stories as well, but that doesn't stick in the mind as much. I like Mark's point about how generally he came up with honest to goodness alternate societies rather than 'Kansas in space' (a legendary slam on Asimov's futures, I forget the source of the quote), but like Mark I'd wonder what a rereading these days would be like.

(come on fellow Dune nerds!)

did anyone else find the Bene Gesserit to be a bit annoying?

What say you of the idea that _Dune_ helped the ecology movment come along in the 60s, after _Silent Spring_? I mean, you have Pardot Kynes in the thinly veiled guise of the author openly talking to the reader with the point of the story. Even the dying Liet-Kynes complains that the guy's lecturing, so Herbert's completely aware of what he's doing, and yet he continues. Hell, plenty of what was written four decades on ecology and systems things still holds up strong.

I talked to some 40something dude at CMJ one time over beers about that and he seemed to completely agree with what you're talking about.

dammit, i'm leaving out words again. "four decades ago" etc etc.

Tom, what year(s) did you attend CMJ?

http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/images/n0/n2093.jpg

^his best book^

1998 I fink

that whip would make a sexy tail

rumpie?

btw, dune = super classic, I want to read all the dune books again, and I think I may start tomorrow

http://www.ozon.ru/multimedia/books_covers/1000107536.jpg

^FH's name looks grebt in cyrillic^
(is this whipping star? google sez yes but i dont read russian)

Hellstorm's hive FTW

i had a great thread years ago of SF book covers but i don't know how to search for it :(

where have you been? look on new answers for "why are sci-fi/fantasy books so crappy" thread, there's a link to my sci-fi book cover thread on there

mark, check here:

S/D: Freaky/psychedelic pulpy book cover design

did anyone else find the bene tleilax sexy?

Wasn't this the religious order of women from the first book? I always pictured them as Mother Teresa types (except evil Mother Teresa-types).

i'm fairly sure it's a thread i started, kingfish -- and probbly like four or five years ago

of course being mine it has a komedy title that even i won't understand

that's Bene Gesserit

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_universe

xp ah. either way, there's another thread to play in

yeah, here's another bit I just found out about, that it was the Oregon coast that had a hand in creating the story, where dude was sent to write about efforts to control and work with the sand dunes by developing grasses and the local ecology.

Also, here's a neat little interview from 1981 where it actually mentions some of the guy's personal habits & research into alt.energy, sustainablity, and so forth(pretty damn good for twenty six years ago). I find it enjoyable and not really surprising that he himself took to Fremen-like ways of actually realizing methods of local production, only focusing on energy instead of water, natch, and incorporating his youth on a farm in the Pacific Northwest.

And the interview is pretty amusing for the seemingly incredulous questions like:

PLOWBOY: So you use your futuristic fiction to comment on contemporary problems?

You can read a book on Frank Herbert written by Tim O'Reilly (founder of computer-book publishers O'Reilly). It's available online at:

http://tim.oreilly.com/herbert/index.html

I haven't done more than skimmed it, but the bibliography at least might be of interest to Herbertophiles.

did anyone else find the bene tleilax sexy?

they had the face dancers, yeah? Rowr.

I love Dune. I read three, I think. I didn't know there were six!