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BIG Dune fan here...from WAY back. Count me as one of the few who actually like Brian and Kevin's adaptation. I've read everything completely (in the order given earlier in this thread) except for the last two books, which I am working on (well into Hunters of Dune...so far it's actually pretty good) including The Road to Dune and Dreamer of Dune. To be honest, I think Brian and Kevin actually have stayed fairly close to Frank's vision. Much of what they've written follows and supports Frank's history of the future, characters and events. You can't expect their writing style to be the same as Frank's. Otherwise, you're just setting yourself up for a huge disappointment. His style and knack for letting us into the minds of his characters is lost forever. Using his notes and unfinished works, Brian and Kevin have done an admirable job. I applaud them for taking on such a huge and important endeavor. I challenge anyone who thinks otherwise to write a better story. I think the problem with people not liking what they've read from Brian and Kevin is due to, in large part, their unfair expectation that the new books should read like Frank's. Another reason is possibly that they can't handle the emotional roller coaster involved with the new stories. But that's just it-these people don't seem to GET that's what it's all about: the trials, tribulations, suffrage, successes and glories of societal development and human evolution spanning over thousands of years. As for me, I believe Brian and Kevin -in bookending Frank's works- have succeeded in evoking from me such strong emotions and a deep sense of a long, epic journey whose events, places and people of the past are but faded echoes from a distant horizon that beckon to us for a "simpler time" as we move forward in an uncharted, unpredictable future.
Of Frank's original six books, I think Chapterhouse and Heretics were the best.
Ultimately all things are known because you want to believe you know.
-Zensunni koan
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