18 Books Like Dune by Frank Herbert to Spice Up Your Reading List

If the concluding events of Dune: Part Two had you going WTF, you’re not alone. Rather than wait for Villeneuve to make another adaption, you can simply read Dune Messiah by Frank Herbert, the second of six total Dune novels. This one deals with Paul Atreides’s not-so-successful reign as Emperor, as many factions (including the Bene Gesserit) conspire to undermine him. 

Moreover, we learn that Chani didn’t give birth to a daughter, but to preternatural twins who have full access to their ancestral memories. If Paul and Chani’s emotional journey was your favorite part about Dune, Dune Messiah is a thrilling follow-up that focuses on the next and final chapter of their lives. 

British novelist Arthur C. Clarke is one of science fiction's all-time great writers, and Childhood's End is one of his most thought-provoking works. Set after an alien invasion, Childhood's End examines mankind in submission. Ruled by a more powerful alien race, mankind benefits in some ways and suffers in others. Clarke's view of power imbalances and interstellar colonialism should be of interest to Dune fans, though Childhood's End is in some ways very different from Frank Herbert's masterpiece.

The fictional planet of Riverworld is arguably Philip José Farmer's greatest creation. Riverworld is a large terraformed planet dominated by a river valley that snakes all over its surface. It is home to humans who have been artificially resurrected for some unknown purpose. Farmer's use of sexual and religious themes, along with his strange and carefully constructed setting, will intrigue fans of Dune.

If reading or watching Dune made you long for star-crossed lovers caught in the crossfire of history’s bloody battles and stories told over multiple timelines and generations, you will adore this epistolary novel by This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone. 

It narrates the story of two secret agents—Red and Blue—who are on opposing sides of a war, risking everything for love, leaving secret letters for each other across time and space. Poignant and poetic, this sci-fi novella is an excellent addition to the corpus of timey-wimey love stories.

For science fiction fans, Timothy Zahn needs no introduction. Zahn is one of the greatest to ever write in the genre, and while he didn’t write Dune, Zahn has written a few all-time classic science fiction novels of his own. Among them is Triplet, in which Zahn creates a planetary system as vividly imagined as the Dune universe. The Triplet system comprises battle-scarred planets that are connected by portals and full of mysterious and primal magic. Readers explore Triplet along with a researcher, giving Zahn's novel an anthropological feel that suits the world-building.

Kate Elliott's Jaran imagines an interstellar future in which a massive political power, the Chapalii empire, governs conquered planets — including Earth. Protagonist Tess Soerensen, a native of Earth, leaves home for the planet Rhui. There, she meets the Jaran, natives of Rhui who live as nomads and are ruled by none other than Soerensen’s own brother. Like Frank Herbert’s Dune, Elliott’s Jaran wrestles with ideas of colonialism and imbalances of political and military power.

Bruce Sterling's Involution Ocean reads like a speculative fiction version of Moby Dick. Sterling's protagonist is hooked on a powerful drug derived from the whale-like creatures native to the deep sea of the planet Nullaqua. He joins up with a whaling ship in the hopes of getting his next fix. Involution Ocean's vividly imagined world, with its crucial commodity and native megafauna, is reminiscent of Arrakis in Frank Herbert's Dune.

If you were fascinated by the efforts of the Fremen who over multiple generations sought to transform the desert planet of Arrakis into a lush green paradise, you might be interested in Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy. Published in the 90s, these books deal with the project of terraforming Mars over two centuries. 

Riddled with sandstorms, Mars is a pretty inhospitable planet, until a group of 100 colonists arrive there in 2026 with an ambitious plan to transform the planet forever, even as Earth is ravaged by ecological disaster and economic ruin.  Ambitious and ingenious, Red Mars is a groundbreaking work by a visionary writer. 

Frank Herbert is best known for Dune and other classic novels set in the same universe. But the somewhat lesser-known novels that Herbert set in his Destination: Void universe are well worth reading if you're a fan of Herbert's writing. Herbert's 1979 novel The Jesus Incident is the second novel set in the Destination: Void universe (after the eponymous Destination: Void, published in 1965), though its plot ties it more closely to its two sequels, The Lazarus Effect (1983) and The Ascension Factor (1988). Readers can skip Destination: Void and read The Jesus Incident and its two sequels as a trilogy if they so choose. Like Dune, Herbert’s The Jesus Incident is concerned with post-Earth mankind and colonial ambitions. The novel alternates narratives, covering settlers on the ocean planet of Pandora as well as characters aboard an orbiting ship, where the shipboard AI has become sentient.

If the Holy War in Dune piqued your attention, you might also want to check out The Forever War, a military science fiction novel by Joe Halderman where humans are embroiled in an interstellar war against the Taurans, a fierce alien civilization. Regarded as a classic, this contemplative novel draws on the author’s own experience as a Vietnam War veteran and promises to be an unforgettable read.   

Like Dune, Asimov's Foundation is widely considered to be one of the greatest science fiction novels of all time. The parallels don't end there, though: Both novels are set in distant futures and envision mankind far removed from its Earth-bound past. Both consider the role of prophecy, and both create convincing worlds rich enough to host plenty of sequel and prequel works.

Based on Issac Asimov’s influential Foundation series, Gregory Benford’s Foundation's Fear is an ambitious novel that tackles a declining Galactic Empire, advanced mathematics and psychohistory. While familiar Asimov characters such as Hari Seldon get the center stage, Benford departs from some of Asimov’s concepts and replaces them with his own. Compelling and thoughtful, Foundation’s Fear is a good fit for hard sci-fi enthusiasts.

Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game is one of the greatest science fiction novels ever written, but the story doesn't end there — and fans of Dune might prefer the sequel to Ender's Game, 1986’s Speaker for the Dead, over the original. Speaker for the Dead witnesses an older Ender on a foreign planet, where human colonists and a native alien species struggle to understand each other—with sometimes violent results.

Like Frank Herbert, Dan Simmons has a real talent for detailed and convincing grimdark world-building. The universe of Hyperion is dominated by the Hegemony of Man and connected by portals that make interstellar travel a breeze. Hyperion uses essentially the same structure as Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales: A frame tale contains a series of short stories with different protagonists.

If you're in the mood for more Dan Simmons, you can't go wrong with Song of Kali. 

Dune with its sandworms and hostile deserts, of course, has its moments of sheer terror. If you’re up for more moments of bone-chilling terror, you should give the World Fantasy Award-winning novel set in the dark underbelly of 1970s Calcutta. The novel follows an American family in search of a long-lost manuscript that has eerie connections to the blood sacrifices performed by an ancient cult. Bizaare, alien and utterly grisly, this novel is sure to appeal to horror aficionados. 

An enthralling space fantasy debut by Esmie Jikiemi-Pearson, The Principle of Moments is a fun and invigorating read for fans of Dune. Straddling a Regency-era time travel romance with a rescue mission unfolding in the 60^th century, the novel is one hell of a rollercoaster ride. And for those deeply missing Arrakis, this book also has a desert planet called Gahraan, where humans work as indentured laborers under the tyrannical rule of Emperor Thracin.

Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie is gloriously weird, inventive, and wholly unlike anything you’ve read before. The first title in her Imperial Radch trilogy, Ancillary Justice follows the escapades of Breq in her quest for revenge.  She’s an “ancillary”—referring to a human body enslaved to an artificial intelligence of a starship. 

Once upon a time, Breq was actually the Justice of Toren, a ginormous starship with an artificial intelligence connected to thousands of soldiers—until a terrible treachery separated her from the mothership, leaving her with a fragile human body and a burning desire for answers … and revenge.

The political intrigue of Dune is a big part of the reason that the book and its sequels have stood the test of time. Zelazny's Lord of Light is a great choice for fans of politics in science fiction plots. Like Dune, Lord of Light envisions a post-Earth future for mankind and has a great interest in colonialism and spirituality. The bad news: Unlike Dune, Zelazny’s Lord of Light has no sequels, prequels, or spin-offs to turn to after the last page.