Customer Reviews

The Battle of Corrin (Legends of Dune #3)

5 star:		(22)
4 star:		(24)
3 star:		(23)
2 star:		(24)
1 star:		(14)

 

 

One steps into this series not expecting the achievement of Dune, an unfairly high standard, but a good read with maybe some flashes of Dune's complexity of character, plot, and philosophy. The first book of this trilogy, the Butlerian Jihad, failed in the latter two areas but the plot was a good enough read to overcome those flaws. The second book was a step backward, with the same weak characterization, but this time not balanced by a strongly told story. The Battle of Corrin, unfortunately, continues the downward trend. As in the other books, characterization is almost uniformly shallow, which is tough to do since some of these characters we've seen over the course of several long books now. Those characters we've seen in prior books don't seem to have developed much and the new characters are mostly two-dimensional. The plot is weak, mostly an episodic narrative of battles among the three major groups at war (the humans, the cymeks, the robots). The weakness of the plot is exacerbated by the "been there, done that" sense of repetition. It seems the three books could easily have been combined into two, making for a more streamlined, less repetitive narrative. Not everything needs to be a trilogy (Tolkien be damned). Another flaw affecting involving both plot and character is that too many actions seem arbitrary or contrived, done more for a plotline than developing out of character. Some, in fact, seem wholly out of character or simply unbelievable. Finally, whereas the first book mostly avoided the prequel problem of rote action meant to connect the dots of later books, this one is rolling in it, filled with awkwardly introduced or clumsily handled events/phrases written in so the reader can go "ahh, so that's why they call them xxxxxxxx in Dune". Admittedly, it's a tough problem to overcome for any prequel, but seldom have I seen it so poorly handled.
If this were book one I'd definitely recommend against starting the trilogy. But chances are, if you've reached Battle of Corrin, you're going to read it no matter what just to finish the series and see those connections to later Dune books. So all I can say is don't expect much, don't feel bad about skimming, and have a good book set aside to dive into when you're done; you're going to want to recapture a good read quickly.

Where others have attacked this series of books for not living up to the original Dune, I've tried to give them the benefit of the doubt. Sure, they don't compare with Frank Herberet's masterpiece, but then I never expected them to. On their own, the first two novels were good "Star Wars"-style space opera; however, this book was just not as good. It was almost as if the authors wanted to get the series done and over with so they could move on to other ideas. I think it also lacks in continuity between the other novels. The first two books featured the same characters and followed within several years of the Jihad timeline. This book jumps ahead several decades and introduces and entirely new cast of characters, with the exception of Vorien Atreides who survives because he received life extending treatments from his father. Near the end, the book seems rushed and falls flat. What started out as an OK continuation of the Dune saga fell flat with this novel.

Like so many others, I did not expect this series to equal or surpass the original Dune series.

I have been quite pleased with this series until now, enjoying the opportunity to view the world of Dune from a new perspective. Watching Herbert's universe take shape has actually been quite entertaining.

This particular book, however, falls short. The writing feels forced and rushed, the dialog completely inane, the characters stripped of any complexity. The villians are stupid and easily manipulated. The characters make rash decisions with vast, universe-shattering consequences but do not even pause to do a bit of soul-searching for the benefit of the by now befuddled reader.

The sentences are often redundant and obviously barely edited, if at all. The book is readable, but the poor writing intrudes constantly.

If you're a follower of the series, you might rent it from the library to find out how the conflict ends, but I'm not sure it's worth the 7.99. (To add insult to injury, my copy, at least, is poorly printed.)

Honestly,the Butlerian Jihad Prequels are hit and miss to a large degree.The overall story is engaging and entertaining but not presented well,in my opinion.As the reviewer below mentions,the characters are all pretty one-dimensional and hard to get inside of.The novels seem to read more like a history than an actual storyline.Kind of like watching Gettysburg as a stage play instead of a film.But then again perhaps that was the intent.It does have a sweeping span to it,but it is more akin to short chapter-like Star Wars episodes than the original Dune novels.
And to respond to some of the loose ends that another reviewer mentioned...As most of you probably know,Anderson and Herbert also intend to finish the Dune Chronicals with two more novels that take place after Chapterhouse:Dune.These novels are going to come directly from Frank Herbert's outlines before his untimely death.In Chapterhouse,it was implied that the Honored Matres and others were coming back to the empire because they were fleeing another power.It was never explained what they were running from.It would make sense that according to the Butlerian Prequels,since Omnius sent out the copy/probes of itself and "uploaded" himself into deep space,that the Thinking Machines may be returning to Imperium space after 14,000 years.This is also implied by a sequence in the novel House Corrino where a Guild heighliner accidently jumps out of known space and the navigator senses an intense hatred of humanity in that unknown area.That could be consistant with the Machines still being in existance.Since aliens or other intelligences have never been in the Dune dogma,this fits as well.
So I think the loose ends will end up playing a part in the Dune finale novels.As to the fate of certain characters,it's rather refreshing to leave the story a little open ended as far as the Atreides and Harkonnen dynasties.Perhaps for the readers imagination or future novels/short stories.
As far as being disappointed with the novels,I'm not.They are entertaining (if not somewhat predictable) and good reading material if you love the Dune saga.Are they on par with Frank Herbert's epic novels?No..unfortunately not.But these are different authors with their own styles and storytelling methods.One can't forget that.But I think the saga is still in good hands..who better to continue than his son?...and I'll still look forward to the next installment....

The original Dune is arguably the greatest science fiction novel ever written; Lotus magazine readers voted it the greatest work of imaginative literature of all time. This being said, it is nothing but a pity that Battle of Corrin was ever written.

Let me start out by saying that describing a planet-wide space battle does not make the said space battle exciting. The original Herbert didn't have to rely on cheap attention-grabbing ploys; he was so good at capturing attention that he even left much of the 'action' offstage.

Ok, so Frank Herbert is dead and there is no one even remotely like him left in the world of sci-fi literature. It would be selfish and even downright idiotic to asume that his son and Kevin J. Anderson could come anywhere close to him in terms of writing. That does not mean, however, that they should not be exempt from two glaring faults:

1. A ridiculous premise that comes very close to flatly contradicting the original Dune material. The Butlerian Jihad, from my understanding, was NOT a literal struggle between humanity and sentient, malicious machines. It was instead a semi-religious movement that purged computers from society. Making the Jihad into a literal war is blatant and cliche; I could have re-watched the Matrix if I'd wanted to experience that. The original Herbert was all about subtelties and hidden meanings, of which there are none in Battle of Corrin.

2. A shameless set-up to the likewise awful 'Hunters of Dune.' So Omnius sends out probes and a mysterious 'signal' into the unknown universe, does he? As I read that, I groaned. The simple plotline of Humanity vs. Omnius carelessly tosses the six originals to the wind. The dune universe is about the Atreides and the spice, NOT thinking machines that could have come from B-movies.

If you're a fan of the six original Dunes, I'd recommend not buying this one. In all likelihood, you'll be disappointed.

All they need to do is connect the dots.

Up to this point I felt Dune-Lite is better than no Dune at all. Sure they're fluffy and one dimensional, and don't really touch on themes/philosophy in the depth that F.H. did. But he left some big literary shoes to fill, so I was willing to enjoy these new novels for what they are.

The Butlerian Jihad started out OK, unfortunately the last installment is just a fiasco that gets worse and worse leading up to and including the title battle itself. The story is Mystery Science Theater 3000 fare, the characters are B-movie archetypes, and the dialogue is mawkish soap opera cheese (even from the robots!). The villains have become corny silver-age comic book fiends. The Titans have become the Transformers. This book is really a slap in the face, it should never have been released.

My biggest gripe is the dialogue. I've never read a book before that made me roll my eyes and groan "ugh" out loud, ever. Hamfisted, insipid, drivel. Here are some memorable gems:
-The Mentat origin: "I am your mentor, you are my mentee...You need a nickname...I will call you my Mentat". Wow, so this is one of the origins we've been waiting for?
-"A Butler serves unto no one". This corny pun wasn't even clever the first time I read it, after the twelfth time I felt like puking. The fact that it's someone's dying words is criminal.
-"Spice Rush", yep just like the old west. There's spice in them thar dunes!
-Omnius' "multiple personality disorder" Cyber-Sybil?
-The retro-virus, Compound X, piranha mites. Muhuhahahaha! Is Dr. Doom collaborating with Omnius now?
-"Death to the Machines!" No need to explain this one.
-Agamemnon's battelship form is a "demonic Pterodactyl". He's a Dino-bot!
-"It's about taking the think out of the thinking machines" Until he said this, Vorian was the one redeeming character of this series. At this point in the book I realized someone was playing a joke on me.
-Erasmus was another bright spot in this series, but he went from being the sadistic scourge of humanity to a mawkish drama queen. Yuck.
-The worm jousting - this is a joke, right? WORM JOUSTING? Shaitan reduced to cockfighting? Don't believe me? Look at the cover of the book!

The ending is absurd. All they needed to do was tie things up credibly - we know what the end result is going to be, it's the journey that needs to be fleshed out with some integrity. Everything is just way too easily, conveniently, and cleanly tied up, like they phoned it in. I'm willing to suspend disbelief and enjoy a light read, but this one was a bomb.

The blame for this book goes beyond Herbert and Anderson, where were the editors? Seriously.

Somebody please tell me this was all just a joke.

This was a VERY difficult book for me to read. I tried many times to focus and get into the story, but the poor job of storytelling made this impossible. The plot was not cohesive at all. It jumped all over the place making the story very unpolished and uncomfortable to read. Sadly, when compared to its predecessors, this book was not a huge disappointment - it simply continues the trend of bad writing. Please do not waste your time with this one.

I find it interesting that many reviewers gave this book low rating because its a lightweight material. I see no reason to debate that since this book is relatively lightweight. But its also unfair to compared it to the complexity of Frank Herbert's works since I don't believed that was the authors' intent.

This book is neither good as or bad as the first two books. All three books were basically lightweight materials. But I thought they were all pretty entertaining stuff that you can read for pure relaxation. Many people couldn't get into Frank Herbert's works because it was complex, deep and thought provoking. But these two authors who wrote the Legend of Dune series wrote for almost anyone who can read the English language. I think there is merit on that score.

If you read the first two books in this series, then you know what to expect and I would strongly recommend that you will finish up the series. Battle of Corrin is a light reading material despite of its thickness in pages and it does tildy up the series. Beside, if you really didn't like these books, you would never read pass the first book anyway. I am sure that all these reviewers who gave this book one and two stars found themselves reading on because there is a quality within these pages. After all, after the first two books, how can you be surprised???

This (hopefully) last "Legend" tale was the worst. Like other reviewers, I devoured the original series and even liked the three "family" series. But something changed in the "Legends" Series - the story not only got off track but introduced elements that were disconcerting in the least.

Where to start? The sadism was so bad that when Erasmus or one of the Titans drew near to a human I skipped ahead, unable to stand any more elevated rationalizations from these monsters. Besides, we are never told why they act as they do - what drove them to this madness? Speaking of madness, the cult of Serena was one of the wackiest ever. The idea of unarmed mobs taking over a governnment was absurd.

Then we had those interminable battle scenes that were the epitomy of dullness. The conversations among the robots were ridiculous, more like something on Mystery Science Theater. There were too many characters and the hero (Vor Atriedes)remained distant, never acquiring a personality. Also the characters made decisions totally "out of character" again and again. The writing style (three pages/chapter) is annoying, making it seem like a series of vignettes instead of a seamless tale.

On the plus side, we learn the origins of the Spacing Guild (Norma, my favorite character, appeared briefly). The origins of the Bene Geserit - more an accident than a purposeful event - was a good saga. We learn why the Harkonnens are hated, the Atriedes admired and the Corrinos in command. I hope the authors move on to other things...drop the robots, the battles and get on with the mythology.

Oh, for proper editing. I am a long term Dune fan having read the original back in high school long, long ago. Frank Herbert had the remarkable imagination to make up histories, societies, cultures and religions. I can still go back to the first three Dune novels and marvel. Many scenes are still etched in memory. I have read all the foregoing Dune prequels. None are memorable. Much of the dialog is contrived. In as much as they worked some off of Dad's notes they fill in the some of the history. Battle for Corrin is another plodding addition. Why, oh, why does every character have to be reintroduced every chapter at the expense of true development? Why does prequel history have to be reiterated over and over? Why does the language have to be so stilted. This series could have been half the size with twice the pacing. It is almost as if the authors do not trust their audiences' intelligence. Nostalgically I want to like it, but it is hard to maintain attention. Much like director's cut DVDs, the whole trilogy could do with combining into one manuscript, severely editing redundancy and working out the plot holes. Then divide it into 2 or 3 much shorter, punchier, more logical books. Not likely to happen.