I just started reading this and I fucking love it. I'm only about 50 pages into it, what else can I expect?

That's good. I'll still jump in on it.

princess irulan btfo

I really enjoy universe building, so the new words and building of a past in the book's universe excites me.

You can, but unless you dislike it you should read Messiah because the story of Paul is more or less wrapped up in that book, Messiah feels a little too businesslike for me to truly enjoy it but you get a lot of important details, it almost feels like the epilogue to the first book. The third and fourth books are also worth reading. Five and six less so.

The themes explored in Dune are why I still enjoy it, I loved it for the worldbuilding and lore when I was a kid but now I see that there was so much more there. I can't think of a single fictional work that analyzes the idea of the Ubermensch in such a thought provoking way. I think stylistically, Herbert is a bit sterile, but he was quite thoughtful.

One of his shorter novellas I recently read, The Whipping Star, was also kind of interesting.

The world building is great. I was thoroughly impressed with what Herbert achieved in Dune. My complaints would have to be the predictable story ending and most of the characters never felt real. Paul came off to me as superman saving the world.

someone help me please

I've read so much sci-fi and I'm running out. I need something that isn't

What are you guys reading right now that you would recommend? Or what is a book you really like? Fantasy is great too, but I haven't read any fantasy in the last year or so that hasn't been completely uninspired or boring/predictable.

Dune and Hyperion Cantos are my favorite sci fi series of all time, can anyone recommend me anything similar at all? Goodread's recommendations record is so far 1 good one for every 5 ones I read off of them, I need real people's opinions.

whoops

>something that isn't shitty/trite/uninteresting

I know that isn't specific but go read the First Law Trilogy and you'll have exactly those three words expanded into three books.

Nova by Delany

Asimov

Gene Wolfe is right up your alley

And maybe Bakker, he's hit or miss for alotta people

I'm workin my way through him right now, is the foundation series worth continuing? I liked the first one but I was willing to leave it at the end. Does it suffer from excessive sequels being worse?
Never heard of either, thank you I will look into them.

All of them are good. 100% all.

try chronicles of the necromancer, gail z martin. refueled my love of high fantasy.

The second and third book in the trilogy are on par with the first. I would even say the quality goes up. If you found the first book boring though, I would read skip out on finishing the trilogy.

No I liked the first book, but I just assumed that the next crises would pan out exactly the same in that all of this was accounted for way back in the past and as long as everyone follows what Selden calculated everything will be fine. I'll put them on my list if they're as good.

more of a continuation of the plot than anything

i like the universe and imagery, but the plot is full of tired tropes. young kid finds out he's the chosen one and saves the day. honestly i don't get all the love for this book.

The plot is only tired tropes for the first book, after that everything gets really different and for me at least, really interesting.

It's not 100% fair to judge a book based on all the books that come after it, and you're right, but Dune is so good and so unique in its later books they kind of have to be included when anyone talks about the first one.

>young kid finds out he's the chosen one and saves the day
Not even, and Dune takes those ideas farther than most stories ever do.

Proxima and Ultima by stephen baxter. Both are solid.

I'm no big fan of Dune, but if you came away thinking that being the Chosen One was supposed to be awesome and super-happy, you probably missed important bits.

Don't listen to this bullshit, the second one is the best one in the entire series, but yes, you can read the first one stand alone if you want to.

That's why you have to read the second at least. See what a prophet does to a people.

Dune's categorization as Sci-Fi is strange to me, considering that the strongest aspect of the book is Paul's Messiah role and the way his consciousness gets all weird and out of sync, and how all that mystic shit is portrayed in prose. It's definitely falls more under the Fantasy umbrella.

True that, but those are not the only elements. There's also a very strong focus on ecology for example, and in the second one you get to see more of some of the other factions, such as the Tleilaxu and the Guild, which are pretty sci-fi.

Expect lots of internal monologues, philosofical discussion about destiny, duty and society and loads of political intrigue

This. Red the second and see where being the hero and the chosen one gets you and your followers. Frank Herbert wanted to make it clear that heroes are sort of tragic, specially when they comit mistakes or set terrible events into motion

Lord of Light, by Roger Zelazny. Weird and original

>what else can I expect?

Master bait.

It seems like only the first book is acclaimed and the rest fell into obscurity.

The 4th is well known for le worm emprah, but beyond that, I'd agree the sequels are obscure to those who aren't sci-fi readers.

I think a lot of people were disappointed by Dune Messiah because the fairy tale prophecy revenge etc. story didn't end in a totally happy way, so it makes sense that they sort of dropped off after that.

user's also missing the fact that the first also obviously has the 'being the chosen one sucks' thing as a theme.

Gonna need more info than that, you say you've read a lot of sci-fi but it sounds like you might not have read many staples of the genre

Do I recommend you something to start you off like Forever War or have you read tons and want really hard SF? How are you for classic (the romantic adventures in space type) sci-fi like Arthur C Clarke for example?

>saves the day.
nigger did you read the book?

story of a dark messiah