Dune Messiah (Mini-Review)

Dune Messiah is the second original Dune novel written by Frank Herbert. Paul Atreidies has become the new Emperor and countless numbers of people have died in his jihad. Reverend Mother Mohiam, Princess Irulan his wife, Edric the Guild Navigator, and Scytale the Tleilaxu Face Dancer seek to overthrow the Atreidies. At the unfortunate center of this conspiracy is the innocent concubine Chani since Paul seeks to have children with her.

One justification Paul uses for everything he does is that there is only one viable future and he has to go down that path. However, that justification is proven to be wrong. At certain points in the book he remarks how things differ from his visions. He even remarks about trying to create life and not realizing life had already been created. This basically means that no future is certain and he failed to realize that he can't create a future. Well..he realized that once it was too late. He had never been forced to do a single thing and merely wanted to be adored for his failures. Chani didn't have to die. He didn't need to be responsible for the jihad. He didn't have to go blind and destroy lives in that attack.

Frank Herbert wrote Paul Atreidies as a warning against charismatic leaders. He isn't the hero of the story and this book pushes that idea harder than the first. Which means a lot of people that didn't pick up on the subtleties in the original book grew angry. How could their hero suddenly change? The truth is that Paul didn't suddenly change into a villain for the sequel. His villainy was always there, we were just too caught up in his struggles to notice.

Duncan Idaho is brought back in the sequel. This is done by having the Tleilaxu clone him and give him to Paul as a 'gift'. Throughout the book Duncan's identity is questioned. Clearly he is part of a trap by the conspirators but figuring out how is the mystery. The moment when his purpose is revealed had me on the edge of my seat. I wanted to cry out but...he's just a character on the page.

I would highly recommend Dune Messiah to fans of the Dune series. I would also recommend Dune Messiah to those looking for a good science fiction book.