To enter the Dune Universe is to enter a very weird space indeed. Beginning in 1965 Frank Herbert wrote a total of six Dune novels and this strange, often bewildering series tracks the millennium-spanning impact of a superhuman messiah on humanity. The Dune saga is many things: a scifi landmark; an extrapolation of a post-technology society; a white savior story that subverts savior myths (but not whiteness); one of the finest examples of worldbuilding ever put to paper; a meditation on machine society, on free will and on the ontological telos of humanity; and (especially in the first novel) a thinly-“veiled” post-colonial fable about the liberation struggles of a ferocious ecologically-minded Bedouin-adjacent people on a desert planet whose coveted resource (the life-extending mind-altering spice) powers the entire Universe.
This is the stuff that makes me subscribe. Deep nerd culture and deep dives into writing craft = take all my money, sir.
Two things:
1. I hope you eventually put together a course or a book out this - the mix of sci-fi, fantasy, and literature related topics along with writing instruction together are things I didn't get when I was an English undergrad way back when. I think this is a terrific niche that has a bigger audience out there looking for something like it. There's nothing people love more than being in on cool shit, except knowing how that cool shit works and using it to their advantage. You are onto something here.
2. Hexology. Check out the Energon Universe reboot of GI Joe and Transformers, headed by Robert Kirkman. Energon is the Spice equivelent, and so far there's six different titles and stories out there, each beginning the long game before things eventually come together. The stories are literally the embodiment of everything you've been preaching here, the setups and payoffs, the stakes and character development, and the reason the "Spice" is so valuable to all parties involved. I think you'd dig it.
I loved this - thank you!
these ones are so nerdy im amazing that ANYONE reads them, forget liking them. thanks for giving it a shot, tim
This is the stuff that makes me subscribe. Deep nerd culture and deep dives into writing craft = take all my money, sir.
Two things:
1. I hope you eventually put together a course or a book out this - the mix of sci-fi, fantasy, and literature related topics along with writing instruction together are things I didn't get when I was an English undergrad way back when. I think this is a terrific niche that has a bigger audience out there looking for something like it. There's nothing people love more than being in on cool shit, except knowing how that cool shit works and using it to their advantage. You are onto something here.
2. Hexology. Check out the Energon Universe reboot of GI Joe and Transformers, headed by Robert Kirkman. Energon is the Spice equivelent, and so far there's six different titles and stories out there, each beginning the long game before things eventually come together. The stories are literally the embodiment of everything you've been preaching here, the setups and payoffs, the stakes and character development, and the reason the "Spice" is so valuable to all parties involved. I think you'd dig it.