3.5 

Princess of Dune

By Brian Herbert & Kevin J. Anderson
Princess of Dune by Brian Herbert & Kevin J. Anderson digital book - Fable

Publisher Description

Set two years before Dune, Princess of Dune is the never-before-told story of two key women in the life of Paul Muad’Dib—Princess Irulan, his wife in name only, and Paul’s true love, the Fremen Chani. Both women become central to Paul’s galaxy-spanning Imperial reign.

Raised in the Imperial court and born to be a political bargaining chip, Irulan was sent at an early age to be trained as a Bene Gesserit Sister. As Princess Royal, she also learned important lessons from her father—the Padishah Emperor Shaddam Corrino IV. Now of marriageable age, Princess Irulan sees the machinations of the many factions vying for power—the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood, the Spacing Guild, the Imperial throne, and a ruthless rebellion in the Imperial military. The young woman has a wise and independent streak and is determined to become much more than a pawn to be moved about on anyone’s gameboard.

Meanwhile, on Arrakis, Chani—the daughter of Liet-Kynes, the Imperial Planetologist who serves under the harsh rule of House Harkonnen—is trained in the Fremen mystical ways by an ancient Reverend Mother. Brought up to believe in her father’s ecological dream of a green Arrakis, she follows Liet around to Imperial testing stations, surviving the many hazards of desert life. Chani soon learns the harsh cost of Fremen dreams and obligations under the oppressive boot heel of the long Harkonnen occupation.

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Princess of Dune Reviews

3.5
“went into this knowing I was walking into a Brian Herbert shaped bear-trap for the sake of more Irulan content, and came out of it with so many conflicting feelings. wanting to expand the women in this franchise beyond Paul is a great idea in practice, but admittedly, it falls ultra flat when every chapter is getting interlaced with the most boring male characters in maybe the whole of the franchise. I already don't love multi-pov books that don't tell you who and when they're switching to right away, so that was already a bother, and wasn't helped by how boring anf useless half of those povs were. When the Baron of all people got one after so many of Zenha waffling through things, I think I audibly groaned. some spoiler stuff below tldr : tldr ; I am bothered by retconed ( specifically age retcons ) and while I enjoyed some of the character work done to these very important women, and specifically liked getting into their heads, the rest of this book felt like such a waste of space and energy that it took me far too long to read it, and I got very little enjoyment out of it. additionally, what is with the addition of all the siblings? at first, I was convinced he'd added all the sisters and was willing to bite my tongue when I realized they were mentioned in a throwaway index line in the original Dune novel, so fair enough to develop them a bit more - though, beyond Wensicia, the others feel so useless -, but giving Chani a brother who only exists to make things more complicated and then die? what was even the point? she was getting really nice expansion on her own in this novel without the constantly sulking teenage brother running around like an anchor tied to her feet. could we really not focus just on Chani instead of giving unneeded attention to a brother so obviously marked for death? and that's not even touching on the fact that half of Chani's plot is completely useless and a waste of additional time. while tackling the idea of Fremen rebellion attempts is interesting on paper, watching a bunch of kids fumble around and ultimately do nothing of any importance for half the book was so useless outside of showing a bit more of how Irulan would handle things. conceptually, that would've been cool, but it does almost nothing with it and worst of all, wastes a moment where we could've seen the two girls interact long before either ever even met Paul, which could've been super interesting considering, iirc, they've never even talked on page, only about each other. which brings me to my next point which is that you take away some of the interesting aspects of their triple dynamic when Irulan is DOUBLE the age of Paul & Chani. in the original trilogy, they are all the same age ( 14-15 around the start of first book ). this book puts Chani about two years older than Paul ( who would be about 12-13 if he were in this ), and Irulan at a whopping 26. this book tries to keep some of her characterization from the initial trilogy, but admittedly, the tragedy of her jealousy in Chani / love for Paul / mother to Leto and Ghanima falls very flat when you realize she's been retconned to be a woman in her early forties poisoning a woman half her age. any sympathies of a young woman chasing violence in an unfair situation becomes unusual cruelty from someone who, in this book, is shown to really not like violence or wasted life. it was such an unneeded retcon that is actually made me angry, and I started choosing to ignore it entirely, even in moments where her being her initial age would've have made as much sense. overall, I'm torn. I love Irulan and Chani, and was happy to have found this, even knowing it was likely not going to be as good as I'd hoped, but I'm simultaneously so glad for it to be over.”

About Brian Herbert

BRIAN HERBERT, the son of Frank Herbert, wrote the definitive biography of his father, Dreamer of Dune, which was a Hugo Award finalist. Herbert is also president of the company managing the legacy of Frank Herbert, and is an executive producer of the motion picture Dune, as well as of the streaming series Dune: Prophecy. He is the author or coauthor of more than forty-five books, including multiple New York Times bestsellers, has been nominated for the Nebula Award, and is always working on several projects at once. He and his wife, Jan, have traveled to all seven continents, and in 2019, they took a trip to Budapest to observe the filming of Dune.

Kevin J. Anderson

KEVIN J. Anderson has written dozens of national bestsellers and has been nominated for the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, the Bram Stoker Award, and the SFX Readers’ Choice Award. His critically acclaimed original novels include the ambitious space opera series the Saga of Seven Suns, including The Dark Between the Stars, as well as the epic fantasy trilogy Wake the Dragon and the Terra Incognita fantasy epic with its two accompanying rock CDs. He also set the Guinness-certified world record for the largest single-author book signing, and was recently inducted into the Colorado Authors’ Hall of Fame.

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