The most famous, widely acclaimed and popular of all science fiction novels, named one of the BBC's 100 Novels That Shaped Our World, and the inspiration behind the jaw-dropping cinematic adaptations Dune: Part One and Dune: Part Two.

Frank Herbert (1920-86) was born in Tacoma, Washington and worked as a reporter and later editor of a number of West Coast newspapers before becoming a full-time writer. His first SF story was published in 1952 but he achieved fame more than ten years later with the publication in Analog of 'Dune World' and 'The Prophet of Dune' that were amalgamated in the novel Dune in 1965.