Dune

By: Frank Herbert

Narrated by: Scott Brick, Orlagh Cassidy, Euan Morton, Simon Vance, Ilyana Kadushin, Byron Jennings, David R. Gordon, Jason Culp, Kent Broadhurst, Oliver Wyman, Patricia Kilgarriff, Scott Sowers

Length: 21 hrs and 2 mins

Publisher's summary

Long-listed, Audible.com Best of the Year, 2007

Long-listed, Audible.com 100 Audible Essentials, 2007

Audie Award winner, 2008

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE directed by Denis Villeneuve, starring Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, Rebecca Ferguson, Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin, Austin Butler, Florence Pugh, Dave Bautista, Christopher Walken, Léa Seydoux, Stellan Skarsgård, and Charlotte Rampling

Set on the desert planet Arrakis, Dune is the story of the boy Paul Atreides, who would become the mysterious man known as Muad'dib. He would avenge the traitorous plot against his noble family—and would bring to fruition humankind's most ancient and unattainable dream.

A stunning blend of adventure and mysticism, environmentalism and politics, Dune won the first Nebula Award, shared the Hugo Award, and formed the basis of what is undoubtedly the grandest epic in science fiction. Frank Herbert's death in 1986 was a tragic loss, yet the astounding legacy of his visionary fiction will live forever.

©1965 Frank Herbert (P)2007 Audio Renaissance, a division of Holtzbrinck Publishers LLC

Critic reviews

Audie Award Winner, Science Fiction, 2008
Nebula Award winner, Best Novel, 1965
Hugo Award winner, Best Novel, 1966

"Unique...I know nothing comparable to it except Lord of the Rings." (Arthur C. Clarke)

"One of the monuments of modern science fiction." (Chicago Tribune)

"Powerful, convincing, and most ingenious." (Robert A. Heinlein)

Inconsistent between narration and ensemble

The story was quite good, although it was a bit difficult to follow. Meanwhile, only certain chapters or paragraphs were performed by an ensemble while the rest of the book was the narrator.

Fan-freaking-tastic

One of the best sci-fi stories and examples of world vuilding in history, and an absolutely breathtaking performance that is, after 200 or so audiobooks, still unmatcged in my eyes.

First rate production to make any Fremen proud!

This is one of the best audiobooks that I’ve listened to. Given the large number of characters and complexity of the story, the large cast of superb readers brought this book to life and made it a pleasure to listen to. Bravo!

Best Story Experienced in Years!

This audio book was sooo good. I fell in love with it. I consistently think of the book, I've listen it 3 times already. I applaud both the Author and the excellent Narrators, for the descriptive actions of the characters and the descriptive landscapes. I was able to see "Dune. The Desert Planet" with such clarity! By day and by night I was right there, right beside the characters. Through a little research I found out that this story paved way for such stories and movies as Star Wars, The Matrix, and so many more! After listening to Dune you will not have a problem believing the last sentence.

I really praise this audio book and hope you are able to experience it the same way I have.

FYI - I've watched all the different movies, and was very disappointed. The audio book guides your imagination so good, the story is complete, unlike the movies that have time constraints.

Great!

I read this book years ago when I was in college and enjoyed it then. And I've reread it at least once since then. But now that I'm older, I got a lot more out of the book and really enjoyed it as an audio. I probably will listen to it again in a few years.

Greatest Sci-fi novel. Amature performance.

How could the performance have been better?

Oh my god, the actors were so bad that the producer could not decide to use them or not. They really broke the performance badly. Thankfully, he resisted the temptation for 90% of the novel which was read by a competent reader.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

I read Dune when I was 17. I remember the sadness of finishing a book I did not want to have end. I felt that sadness again.

Any additional comments?

Avoid using actors. Even good actors just ruin the flow of reading.

Best ever

As a child of the fifties I was in a prefect place to be the beneficiary of the best science fiction ever written. By age 15 I had visited many fantastic worlds in My imagination, and by age 18 I was becoming a bit jaded with the current offerings. Enter Frank Herbert and "Dune". His creation blew My mind with its detail, especially at a time when environmental awareness was beginning to come into fashion. I had no idea that such an elaborate world could be contained between the covers of a paperback novel.
In the mid seventies I had the great pleasure of meeting Mr. Herbert at a science fiction symposium at Colorado State University, and it was an experience I will always treasure because Mr. Herbert turned out to be just the nicest down to earth person You would ever want to meet.

Enjoyable.

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

As an intro to sci-fi no. While it's got a lot of good elements, it moves a bit slowly. But if they were already familiar with the genre but hadn't yet come across this one, I would recommend it just because it's considered such a classic.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Honestly, I wouldn't say I had a favorite character.

Would you listen to another book narrated by the narrators?

The main narrator, yes. The man who did the voice of Baron Harkonen, no.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

No, it's a bit dry for that.

Any additional comments?

The multiple narrators was not used to full effect in this audio version. I never could figure out any pattern of when they brought in the cast to do the voices and when they allowed the main narrator to read all parts. There were times when I thought it would have been better to bring in the full cast to better capture the mood but they didn't, and then in shorter exchanges between multiple characters, they do allow the rest of the cast. And the characterization differences between the main narrator and the cast are wildly different and can be a bit jarring at times. Especially when they switch back and forth in the same scene. I wish it had been more consistent.

Only one problem

Main characters are sometimes voiced by different narrators. Randomly, the main narrator takes over and reads everything. Then back to different narrators. It is confusing and annoying. But overall this is a lively audio book and worth a listen.

Fantastic Space opera...

You can see where Star Wars borrowed from this. Herbert was way ahead of his time and the book still holds up so many years later. Cool universe. Interesting characters. Narration was fantastic. I will be digging into other Dune books.