A review by storyorc
Dune Messiah by Frank Herbert

challenging emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This book is what comes directly after every high fantasy happily-ever-after where the protagonist deposes an evil tyrant. I cannot overstate how critical it feels to have this reality check. That may be a tall claim for a story where one of the political enemies is a drug-addicted frog-man who lives in a goo orb but I stand by it. Messiah is to Dune what catching your mom filling stockings is to Santa. Herbert's publisher splitting this into a separate book was an act of thievery from all the readers who stopped after one.

Where the sandworm ecology was most fascinating in Dune, the political ecosystem takes the spotlight in Messiah. We meet competing factions that were only name-dropped before. Each is hyper-competent in their own way and equally chained to each other and their new emperor. None are exactly evil but nor are they sympathetic. Their leaders operate more as concepts than characters. Everyone talks in the abstract, concealing layers upon layers of meaning, and they do so at great length. I appreciate Herbert's dedication to portraying nuanced scheming but at the same time, I am not as smart as I like to think and would have enjoyed more of the book with a few clues as to the moves being carried out in this 4D chess game. (For example, I still don't grasp exactly why Paul felt bound to play out his visions as he saw them, unless it is just that he believes them to be the lesser evil.) Often, a character would refer to something matter-of-factly and only then would I realise that's what so-and-so was hinting at two chapters ago. If those explanations came even one chapter after the hinting rather than two, I would have been able to keep pace more instead feeling dragged along like an upset water-skier.

In a much-needed reprieve, Paul's court is more human than the others, thanks to little touches like nicknaming Stilgar 'Stil'. Neither Atreides is too regal for love, even as their loyalties are stretched in mutually exclusive directions. Alia's romance lacked much build-up (though with the 2021 casting... understandable) but Chani was easy to treasure through Paul's eyes. A reader has to care to appreciate tragedy and Herbert did wring out some care here, even if they speak so formally it keeps the reader at a distance. (That might be intentional; Idaho explicitly ponders reflects on how the language of office obscures the horrors it orders.) 

Themes of fate and identity shout the loudest in this book. The latter had a great pincer maneuver of an exploration; Alia grapples with who she is when she has held all the lives of a Reverend Mother since her time in the womb while Idaho/Hayt's zombie status makes his every thought and preference call into question of how much he is the dead man he wears vs something of his own creation. The fate theme is what really cuts to the core however, dogging Paul's steps right to the end when,
even in tapping out, he only cements the mythic qualities of his bloody legacy
. Brought to mind War & Peace's criticism of Great Man theory via positioning Napolean as carried along by events more than directing them, though with the added dimension of foresight. Herbert never quite lets you forget he's writing sci-fi.

Messiah feels shockingly long for its wordcount.  Despite that, I recommend print over audio (or at least not sped up audio) to stand any hope of digesting it. 

 "Charismatic leaders ought to come with a warning label on their forehead... the most valuable president of this century was Richard Nixon because he taught us to distrust government.
- Frank Herbert