Which Of These Sci-Fi Classics Is Overrated? [100 Book Challenge #74-76]

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00:00 Dune Messiah by Frank Herbert
04:04 Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick
07:22 Kindred by Octavia Butler

[Bookpilled]

This one was filmed in Bosque Los Colomos, Guadalajara.

[Fringeko]

This style of you video in the woods, no music or distractions only nature sounds talking about books is so relaxing and refreshing. Thanks for the great upload!

[ssmytheYT]

Love the backdrop for the video! Great nature shots too. 😀 I really enjoyed the outdoor feel of the video. Really well done. A very nice change.

[andypagano]

Love your reviews! As an older sci-fi guy (73) your passion has re-ignited my own. I don’t know if you’ve ever read Mervyn Peakes Gormanghast trilogy but though ponderous and hard to classify it has power. In a strange way they flesh out Kafka’s castle if you’ve ever indulged the desire to scratch that itch. Thanks

[SciFiScavenger]

Amen! I didnt rate Messiah, but just finished a re-read of Children of Dune and liked that much better, almost as much as Dune itself. 👍

[unstopitable]

From what I remember of Dune Messiah, I was a little perplexed by it. After reading the first book, I found it jarringly parenthetical, written out of necessity just to bridge a gap--to move on to the saga at large. But we're talking about fifteen ago (when I read it.) As you said, it almost seems written by someone else; it just felt off to me. "Soap-opera-ish" definitely hits the nail on the head. As for PKD, for those who actually read him, you discover how many of his characters are really just blue-collar stiffs, trying to get by, when their reality becomes unglued. Though there's a bit of a plot hole in Electric Sheep (how D. actually gets onto the andys' trail at the end), he does a fascinating job of portraying their cold-bloodedness, while at the same time making you feel for their hopelessness. They're both affectively impaired and dehumanized. They remind me a lot of Moreau's creations--animals turned into humans only to be dehumanized. This makes PKD equal to Wells, in my opinion. He was just as groundbreaking. I understand what he was trying to do with the Mercerism thing, especially Buster Friendly. The focus on it, though, feels annoying at times.

[donaldb]

On first reading _Androids_ as a kid I was really baffled by the religious aspect, I think because up to that point I had only encountered religion in SF in a humanist, Star Trek-style debunking mode, and mercerism looks like it might be like that, but then sort of isn't. It took me a while to appreciate how central a religious attitude is to Dick's work. It is totally different to how I see the world, but it is part of Dick's outlook and part of what makes him such a unique writer in SF.

[OLJeffo]

I just completed Kindred and agree with your take on it. The repeating, unavoidable nature of the protagonist's entrapment in the past is a perfect metaphor for the unending awfulness of slavery. As a novel, I thought this was also its main weakness -- the episodic nature of the storytelling had a sort of sameness that didn't entice me forward for any reason other than to see how Dana navigated her peril. But again, that is exactly what slavery must have been like -- a monotonous, horrifying existence that seemed to have no endpoint other than death. I am glad I read it.

[Satorotas]

Your choice of backdrops and filler shots between reviews were exquisite.

[jameskyle]

I saw Messiah as a bump in the road on the way to Children of Dune. At some point you should give it a shot.

[BookSquirrelUK]

0:28 I have a cool New English Library edition of Dune Messiah that I thrifted, but haven’t read any of the Dune books yet. Waiting to find a decent book one vintage edition before I start reading them.

[mike-williams]

Dune Messiah's value increases with familiarity with the following novels. I read the latter novels as they appeared, but I would go back and re-read the preceding novels so I had a more solid footing. Messiah improved with re-reading.

[alexp]

Fantastic review of Androids, voiced my own view on it better than I could. Would be great to get your read on Martian Time-Slip and Three Stigmata if you get a hold of them. Butler is one I really need to get to, have Lilith's Brood and the two Parables but shamefully not got round to them yet.

[beethoven]

Excellent! I really enjoyed this video, I guess because I found myself nodding in assent over and over. That doesn't always happen when I watch you videos, and that's why (paradoxically) I value them so much. Keep up the great work!

[jimnyenhuis]

So few authors take the loss of agency as seriously as Octavia Butler does -- which is absolutely wild as soon as you read a novel like Kindred, or Dawn, where its importance as a topic is so immediately felt.

[chocolatemonk]

Love Dune and Messiah. The two are separate and messiah is lesser but benefits from close back to back reading. Thank you and I got a Pennington on my shelf.

[YourQueerGreatAuntie]

As ever, thoroughly entertained when you don't like a book! But also loved hearing your thoughts on Kindred. Michael at Fit2BeRead listed it as one of the books that stayed with him the longest. I only got to it after I'd been totally converted to Butler by the Pattern Master series, the Parables and (my favourites!) Exogenesis. Must go back to Kindred now, bearing in mind your perspective on prose stylings. I'm not always looking for that on a first read, unless it's something extraordinary (like Delany). It even took me a second reading to figure out that Ghana Must Go (Taiye Selasi) is all written in iambic pentameter.
Haven't read either Dune or "Do Androids Dream..." (though I love The Androids Dream by Scalzi!), and will give the PKD a go after your comparison to Man in the High Castle, which I found an unexpected delight.

[tequilamondayproject]

It seemed to me, and to others apparently, that Messiah was a response to the misunderstanding of many about the true nature of Paul, his lost battle against an evil destiny and his corruption by power and cult of personality. I think Herbert wanted to make clear his distaste for tyranny and dictatorship, and that Paul was an antihero, a decent person caught up and derailed by powerful events. I think Villeneuve gave this unenviable role to Chani in the new movies, making it clearer that Paul was not fully the hero. Love this channel and have rediscovered my fondness for the genre! Re reading the trilogy now!!!

[Sean-eqhx]

While you are in Guadalajara, there is or was a bookstore called La Perla. They had quite a few sci-fi/fantasy books when i was there

[nicohanley]

This is such a wild review for me since just last month i got about 100 pages into Dune Messiah and didn’t like it nearly as much as the first book, and just last week i started Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep and I absolutely love it. I’m about 120 pages in and it brings back all the nostalgia from the themes of Blade Runner but with a more dystopian feeling and much more complex characters. Glad to hear you liked it also.