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Dunenewt

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The sandworms being transplanted to Arrakis is an old idea, found even in the first novel.  I had hoped that Sandworms of Dune was going to take us to their original home and, perhaps, reveal how they arrived on Arrakis on the first place.  I'd have assumed that this would have also tied into the guilds constant fear of a non-human sentient being.

But we weren't that lucky.  Maybe in another few trilogies from now.

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That will be the last thing they release.  Putting it out sooner would:

1)  Give away plot details of all future books

2) Tie them to set events which they will be unable to change

3) Limit possible sales as people become tiher unhappy with the events in the dune concordia or decide that sicne they already know what is going to happen they do not need to buy future books

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As long as it doesn't interfere with my planned trilogy of Dune books.

I'd bet on Merrit as being next in line before you to write Dune novels, Duennewt.  He's been talking about doing so for years.

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Not when they're all in Gob's Dungeon

*begins plotting*

Oh, well Byron seems like a nice guy, maybe I can be the KJA to his Herbert connection...oh wait, no, I didn't mean that. ;)

But seriously, I don't plan on writing any thing official, but I have a pretty detailed plot lined out for a trilogy so far.

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Inconsistencies happen.  Frank Herbert made a ton of them himself inthe novels.  Even in Dune there is the glaring change of Muad'dib from a constellation to a shadow in the moon.  It's blatant, inconsistent character alterations and "small universe" occurances that annoy me.

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Not when they're all in Gob's Dungeon

*begins plotting*

Oh, well Byron seems like a nice guy, maybe I can be the KJA to his Herbert connection...oh wait, no, I didn't mean that. ;)

But seriously, I don't plan on writing any thing official, but I have a pretty detailed plot lined out for a trilogy so far.

Well, have fun.  Just be carefull you don't end up in court like the current Harry Potter lawsuit!

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The sandworms being transplanted to Arrakis is an old idea, found even in the first novel.  I had hoped that Sandworms of Dune was going to take us to their original home and, perhaps, reveal how they arrived on Arrakis on the first place.  I'd have assumed that this would have also tied into the guilds constant fear of a non-human sentient being.

But we weren't that lucky.  Maybe in another few trilogies from now.

Do you know where I can find this in the first Dune novel?

It was written in the timeline before space travel, so perhaps it is intended to be a non-human being, who has put it on Arrakis.

Why couldn't they be native to Arrakis? Did it give any explanation? And if people in any in the Dune novels knew they were not native to Arrakis, then it was probably humans who brought them there. How else could they then know?

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Humans would have brought it from another planet with sandworms, wouldn't they? (Like the BGs transplanted the worms from Rakis to Chapterhouse) But Arrakis was the only planet with sandworms and sandtrout known to humans. Besides, they didn't know about the sandworm life cycle for a significant period of time. So I don't see how humans could bring the sandtrout to Dune, as it was discovered by humans when it was already populated by sandworms.

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Humans would have brought it from another planet with sandworms, wouldn't they? (Like the BGs transplanted the worms from Rakis to Chapterhouse) But Arrakis was the only planet with sandworms and sandtrout known to humans. Besides, they didn't know about the sandworm life cycle for a significant period of time. So I don't see how humans could bring the sandtrout to Dune, as it was discovered by humans when it was already populated by sandworms.

Hence hte mystery of how the sandworms arrived on Arrakis in the first place, turning it from a water-filled paradise to the Desert of Dune.

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OK, I don't want to be overly negative, but you people are kind of depressing me here. This is all rather old news.

First off, the timeline was prepared by Dr. Attila Torkos, an eye doctor in Hungary who does this sort of chronology of fictional universes as a hobby. (My interpretation: Kevin is too busy out hiking and being "creative" to actually sit down and do this sort of REAL WORK himself. Thank god for devoted fans, huh? And while much is made over this "Dune Concordance" that Brian is supposed to have prepared (he even lists it in his references in <i>Dreamer of Dune</i>), he can't have done a very good job of it based on the inconsistencies they have introduced. Unless they're not mistakes and the real explanation is a series of decisions to intentionally ignore what Frank Herbert wrote in favor of their own ideas. Kevin's view on such inconsistencies is that they're "inconsequential".)

No justification is given for why the entry for the sandtrout being brought to Arrakis (which is from Dune Messiah, btw, not "the first book") is placed at a time when NO HUMAN BEING could possibly have been in space. (Dune is about people. There are no known intelligent aliens in the Duniverse, although the Imperium maintained its nukes (the House arsenals) against the possibility of one day encountering a hostile alien species.) If you read the passage (early) in Dune Messiah, it seems that some of Leto's memories have their origin in Other Memory. That can only mean that the agents of the sandtrout introduction were human, or humans witnessed the event.

My suspicion is that Dr Torkos placed it there based on some information provided by Kevin and Brian. Presumably they introduced those silly Muadru for some reason. (They were mentioned again in both Hunters and Sandworms, remember.) This may be it.

One thing Frank Herbert unwittingly got right was that the sandtrout and worms could not be native to Arrakis. Canopus is a super massive giant star and will supernova after a lifetime of only a few hundred million years...long enough for planets to form but too short for life to evolve.

(My own take is that some human...or machine...group introduced the worms to Arrakis before the Jihad but all records of their existence and activities were hidden or lost in the general data loss of the Jihad.)

(Personal note: I used to think Byron Merritt was a nice enough guy until he caved and gave in to Kevin's petty demands to ban me and some of the other naysayers on the board. He essentially became a yes-man mouthpiece for the official line. He is no doubt looking out for his future piece of the pie after Uncle Brian is finally safely off in the corner drooling [if his writing in Timeweb is any indicator, that's not far off]. He also has twin boys...yet another potential generation of milkers! To the best of my knowledge, Byron is the only one of his generation with pretensions to the pen.)

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He also has twin boys...yet another potential generation of milkers! To the best of my knowledge, Byron is the only one of his generation with pretensions to the pen.)

You don't really mean they're going to write Dune stuff forever? That's sick... :P

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If people are silly enough to keep buying them, why would they stop? ;)

Seriously, though, even though I'm still fairly ticked off at Byron (I had genuinely gotten to like him even though I didn't agree with some of his opinions), I've read some of what he has written and I think he has a lot of potential. He's probably too much a team player to actually reverse or contradict what his uncle has done, but you never know.

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