Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler No new idea's

I started to read the Dune series twice. I got the first 3 1/2 novels read back in the 80's, and the first 5 1/2 novels read about 2 years ago. I've never made it all of the way through. I had 1 1/2 novels left to finish the series. I should re-start with the last one I read only 1/2 of.

I started to read Dune and got about 3 chapters in and gave up. Because of my dyslexia I’m a very slow reader and the story was taking way to long to develop. Back then I was more of a “Lucky Star” and “Doc Savage” fan. I have read most of the “classic” scifi novels but don’t think I’ve read any novels since 2010 (book not year, realized in a month that comment would seem odd). I switched to non fiction when I went back to university sociology, social psychology, political economy, economics, religious/cultural history…you know the interesting stuff.

As we discussed our similar defects before, I'd be willing to be you're not actually dyslexic (I've been diagnosed that way before too). But your low ability to inhibit latent information (the rest of the words on the page) does make it difficult to focus on the one you're actually trying to read.

Though it doesn't matter what it's called, it still makes reading a slow process. But I seem to have better retention and comprehension than most other people I know.

Nice pick up. You are correct it is not really dyslexia I’m diagnosed with but rather than try to explain it every time I just say dyslexia since it gets the point across. I also have much better comprehension/retention than average.

I was never tested as a child because my father was in denial that I might have an issue. You may or may not have noticed, as there’s a few Canadians on the forum, but most of the time I use English rather than American spellings. That’s because my grandmother (from England) got pissed at my dad and took it upon herself to teach me to read and write so I picked up a lot of English mannerisms.

Just for the hell of it when I attended UW Madison after leaving the Marine Corps I got tested and they identified I did have a problem. Though they said it was not actually dyslexia that if fit close enough that they would put me in that category if I wanted thus allowing me more time for tests and such. I declined so as not to have anything like that in my records since things like that can come back and haunt you in the military. Besides by that time I had already figured out workarounds like going to professors half a semester early to pick up the reading list and prolifically highlighting for later reference. Since then I’ve learned that audio books are my friend.

It’s also part of why I hate distractions in my peripheral vision while watching movies/gaming, total blackout is the only way to go.

Lol, I noticed that Dean! and here I thought we were responsible having a bad....errr good influence on your spelling.

I didn't care much for Dune - in fact, I never made it through the VHS. On the other hand, my daughter set up a facebook account for me. I don't pay much attention to it but I did get pingged by some of my old High School buds. We got into a reminisc thing and the movie Doc Savage came up. It was played by Ron Ely, as I recall and it was subtitled "The Man of Bronze".

It’s been so long since I’ve seen the “Doc Savage: Man of Bronze” movie. I remember it being really campy but I still liked it. Had a very matinee serial flare if I remember. I thought it was never released on DVD and Netflix hasn’t had it but look what I found:

http://www.amazon.com/s/?ie=UTF8&keyword..._sl_alqb77b1y_b

I put it in my shopping cart to get when I order some other stuff I’m looking at.

Looks like they might also be making a new one:

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0605775/news#ni1130750

http://www.themovieinsider.com/m6611/2/doc-savage/

I'm sort of ambivalent toward the Dune movie. I did like Kyle MacLachlan as Paul Atreides, and I liked the creepiness of his little sister, but the way the movie's done as a whole is kind of lame. I only read the first novel, but I did like it. I probably liked it more just because it was fun to see a lot of ideas that Robert Jordan borrowed for his Wheel of Time series. I think there's a lot to like about the world Frank Herbert created.

Frank Herbert is a must read for any serious sci-fi fan. The Dosadi Experiment is one of his better books. Books 1-3 in the Dune series were excellent, but I think he lost focus or purpose in the later books.

Yes Dean, the story took a long time to develop, was complicated and multi-threaded. He delves into religion and cultures in conflict, both of which are complicated subjects. I read the first two books 3 times to take everything in. I rarely do that.

I sympathize with your condition Dean. I have no trouble reading, but suck at a lot of card games because I can't pick out patterns well when there is a lot of visual information presented. I also get lost easily when looking at lines of code in a program. Very frustrating at times.

CV, if you like the wy Herbert created a world with his trilogy (the rest don't count) try reading Ursela K. Leguin's The Disposessed. Like Dune, it won the top Sci-Fi and Fantasy awards for the year it was published.