Dune

Things I loved about this book:
- Really good action/fight scenes
- The science fiction gadgets and technology were cool
- Paul seems like a nice kid
- The descriptions of Dune's environment and the critters that try to survive there were powerful
- The obvious nods to Arabic and Bedouin cultures were cool

Things I hated about this book:
- It is ~10,000 years in the future so why is everyone talking and acting like it is Medieval England
- Wife, mother, servant, or sex slave were the only roles available to women
- The Bene Gesserit: WTF is that bullshit
- It changes from a sci-fi adventure into a religious fantasy novel

So I hated it a tiny bit, then I really liked it, then I hated it again while understanding and grudgingly respecting what the author is trying to show us, then I liked the final bit. About halfway through the book I started noodling around online and saw that this book is actually considered more of a prequel to the rest of the Dune series rather than the first book; it is Paul's origin story, and is just setting the stage for the later books. Once I saw that this book made tons more sense, and I could more easily swallow what was happening.

Overall I was truly drawn into the world of Dune but a little disappointed by what I found there.