BGGWW Books discussion

For the second third of Dune (just got here myself).

I finished with Part II yesterday, and I have to say that I think that I liked Part I better. It felt as if P2 was more of a show to promote everyone and move the story along.

Further, P2 seemed to do a less-good job of showing the environment of Arrakis, even when presented with golden opportunities to build the world.

I'm a few pages into the third part, and I'm hopeful it'll be more like the first.

I am finding the book, as a whole, easier to read than I had imagined. (I never read any of the classic Geek Lit until I was an adult, and I threw Pillars of the Earth across the room ["soul mate"] and had difficulty not gagging through some of the chunkier sections of LotR.)

Overall, I was less than thrilled with how they handled the ecology of Arrakis... the appendix improves it, but still doesn't read as fully fleshed-out.

I classify the book as 3 parts -- politics, ecology, and mysticism. And that's the order I'd rate them in this book. Politics top, followed downhill by ecology then mysticism. I just couldn't really get into a sci-fi prophetic system based on genetic interbreeding. The missionaria's seeding of planetary myths was clever, but they goal odd.

I'm a bit into Part 2 now. The attack and chaos at the end of P1 came pretty abruptly.

I like the change in Paul. He's pretty badass.

He's maybe a little too... perfect, though. Too unflawed? I don't know, I'm only 30pp or so into this section. I mean, he struggles a bit with his whole "who am I?" bit, but then he just goes, oh, I'm a badass prophet/Duke/mentat/messiah. Okay, cool. Then moves on.

Still enjoying it.

Just trying to keep activity going so the book club doesn't die out.

From all the talk about how P1 is the best, then P2 and P3 are good but not as good, etc., I was expecting somewhat of a dropoff in enjoyment.

I actually am really enjoying P2. It's more of an adventure story of surviving in the desert. There aren't as many characters coming and going to keep track of. It's more dealing with the world that has been set up. How do you cross a span of sand without getting eaten by a worm? What do you do if a sandvalanche covers your water and tent? How do you handle running into a tribe of renegade Fremen?

So, it is indeed different, but I still very much enjoy it.

Yes, but the answer to those during the escape sequence were "be a bene gesserit MacGyver"