— 4.5 ☆

with beautiful imagery and excellent prose, frank herbert creates desert planet, dune, and uses it to explore themes of human nature, morality, ecology, and systems of power. i really enjoyed this book. 'dune' perfectly embodies why i love fantasy/sci-fi so much: the political mind games, the genius creativity, the scope of discussions - it’s unbelievable how many topics frank herbert manages to touch on. i’m actually in awe.

primarily, this is a book critiquing white saviourism and empire. it gives agency to both the colonised environment and people by outlining the ways that white settlers exploit indigenous peoples, their faiths, and lands. i also loved the environmental commentary. herbert highlights the intersection between environmentalism and colonialism through ecological explorations. i loved that the setting was given just as much attention as the main characters are

i know this book can be controversial, and i think there's a lot to unpack with that. my stance is that the book does a fantastic job at depicting colonisation in its brutal & complex entirety. as frank herbert outlines: 'ecology is the science of understanding consequences' — i think that perfectly summarises the heart of this novel & herbert's intention with this story

my only critiques are that some of the female characters deserved better (when is that not the case, though), and i have mixed feelings about the last third of the book. it felt messy to me (but i did audiobook parts of it, and that could be why)

on the whole, i think this is a mind-blowing sci-fi story that is unlike anything i’ve ever read before. i would love to reread in the future and further pick all these aspects apart, but for now, i'm very excited to continue onto book 2!!

⊱ ─────── ⋆⋅ dune ratings ⋅⋆ ─────── ⊰
dune - ☆☆☆☆.5
dune messiah - ☆☆☆☆.5
children of dune -
god emperor of dune - 
heretics of dune - 
chapterhouse: dune -