Princess of Dune

Brian Herbert · Kevin J. Anderson

Oct 2023 · Macmillan Audio · Narrated by Scott Brick

About this audiobook

"[Series narrator Scott] Brick turns in a rewarding performance" —AudioFile on Dune: The Duke of Caladan

"Scott Brick delivers an impressive one-man show." —AudioFile on The Winds of Dune

Set two years before Dune, Princess of Dune is the never-before-told story of two key women in the life of Paul Muad’Dib—Princess Irulan, his wife in name only, and Paul’s true love, the Fremen Chani. Both women become central to Paul’s galaxy-spanning Imperial reign.

Raised in the Imperial court and born to be a political bargaining chip, Irulan was sent at an early age to be trained as a Bene Gesserit Sister. As Princess Royal, she also learned important lessons from her father—the Padishah Emperor Shaddam Corrino IV. Now of marriageable age, Princess Irulan sees the machinations of the many factions vying for power—the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood, the Spacing Guild, the Imperial throne, and a ruthless rebellion in the Imperial military. The young woman has a wise and independent streak and is determined to become much more than a pawn to be moved about on anyone’s gameboard.

Meanwhile, on Arrakis, Chani—the daughter of Liet-Kynes, the Imperial Planetologist who serves under the harsh rule of House Harkonnen—is trained in the Fremen mystical ways by an ancient Reverend Mother. Brought up to believe in her father’s ecological dream of a green Arrakis, she follows Liet around to Imperial testing stations, surviving the many hazards of desert life. Chani soon learns the harsh cost of Fremen dreams and obligations under the oppressive boot heel of the long Harkonnen occupation.

A Macmillan Audio production from Tor Books.

Ratings and reviews

I'm purely writing this review to complain about the audiobook on the Google Books platform. It takes about 17 hours to read through this book, but they do not section off the chapters like other dune books. They just have a 17 hour long "chapter" that says "Begin reading". Very sloppy formatting. I'd like to know what chapter I'm on. Even if dune books aren't traditionally chaptered with numbers, FH Dunes 1-6 audiobooks are divided by their chapters, and BH Houses audiobooks 1-3 are also divided into chapters. What gives?

About the author

BRIAN HERBERT, son of Frank Herbert, wrote the definitive biography of his father, Dreamer of Dune, which was a Hugo Award finalist. Brian is president of the company managing the legacy of Frank Herbert and is an executive producer of the motion picture Dune, as well as of the TV series Dune: The Sisterhood. He is the author or coauthor of more than forty-five books, including multiple New York Times bestsellers, has been nominated for the Nebula Award, and is always working on several projects at once. He and his wife, Jan, have traveled to all seven continents, and in 2019, they took a trip to Budapest to observe the filming of Dune.

KEVIN J. ANDERSON has written dozens of national bestsellers and has been nominated for the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, the Bram Stoker Award, and the SFX Readers' Choice Award. His critically acclaimed original novels include the ambitious space opera series The Saga of Seven Suns, including The Dark Between the Stars, as well as Wake the Dragon epic fantasy trilogy, the Terra Incognita fantasy epic with its two accompanying rock CDs. He also set the Guinness-certified world record for the largest single-author book signing, and was recently inducted into the Colorado Authors’ Hall of Fame.