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+title = "Heaven Makers (Frank Herbert, 1967)"
+author = ["Michał Sapka"]
+date = 2024-06-19T12:06:00+02:00
+categories = ["reviews"]
+draft = false
+weight = 2012
+reviewSection = ["Books"]
+abstract = "My review of an early Frank Herbert novel"
+image = "reviews/covers/herbert-heaven-makers.jpg"
+rating = 3
+aliases = ["brain-rot/american-scifi/heaven-makers-1967/"]
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+
+Chems are a race of aliens being who learned technology allowing them to live forever.
+With everlasting life comes boredom.
+To mitigate it, they watch and record lives and history of _lesser_ races, one which being humanity.
+They can not intervene, but current team foreseeing operation on Earth may have broken this rule.
+Therefore, Kelexel is sent to investigate if this is the case, but he is pretending to be just a tourist.
+
+At the same time we are observing humans whose lives are being recorded and (maybe) manipulated.
+
+_Heaven Makers_ is a 1967 novel written by Frank Herbert about an immortal race of space beings who treat humanity as a toy.
+OK, there's more to that, but it all boils to this - it's a simple story which gives no indications that just a few years before Herbert published _Dune_.
+
+Let's get this out of the way: _Heaven Makers_ is not a great book.
+It's not bad, by any means.
+The plot is decent, the twists are cool, the characters are (mostly) OK.
+It's not insulting, but it's never great.
+It's also short, so all the underdeveloped or missed parts of the book never develop into real frustration.
+
+And while I have enjoyed reading it over the course of 2 evening[^fn:1] and would not call the time _wasted_, I'm afraid in a year I'll have very little recollection of the events that I've witnessed.
+If anything, it reminded me that I really need to watch _Twilight Zone_.
+_Heaven Makers_ is very much like an episode of that type a show.
+We've got an interesting question (what would you do with eternity?) with added twist (what if you are the victim of such creatures) developed into a full story.
+
+One thing reader needs to keep in mind is the age to this book.
+Your life being subjected to constant surveillance was something not only seen as scary, but also incomprehensible.
+We're now treating is as entertainment (_Big Brother_) or even a way of living.
+As always, SciFi comes with a twisted idea and warns us about it.
+What we do with it?
+Of course!
+Let's build our lives around it!
+
+If _Heaven Makers_ finds a way in your hands, sure - it's a nice read.
+But I would not propose people actively search for it.
+
+[^fn:1]: I am a slow reader