Frank Herbert planned to write seventh Dune book. It is said Hunters of Dune and Sandworms of Dune are based on his notes. Those books don’t feel like they are in same universe. Just in universe with similar characters where similar events happened. This is speculation based on Frank Herbert’s Dune books, Hunters of Dune and Sandworms of Dune. I originally planned to add this to Sandworms of Dune review but it got so long even without this. I haven’t seen Frank Herbert’s plans. This is just what I feel was planned.
I assume massive number of ghoulas didn’t come from Frank Herbert because it breaks to rules of the world. Thinking Machines felt like it was in Hunters of Dune and Sandworms of Dune because Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson wrote book series about them earlier. I see no reason why the threat had to be thinking machines. What God Emperor made mankind do during his reign didn’t prepare mankind for thinking machine’s invasion. It prepared mankind against the plague. We have seen measures against pandemic in 2020 and 2021. God Emperors golden path looked quite similar. No travel and small communities.
Plague was part of Hunters and Sandworms. It fits to Frank Herbert’s environmental message of Dune books. People from scattering got it and they come back because of plague not because of thinking machines. To me that sounds much more like Frank Herbert than what we got.
Face Dancers were built as threat in Frank Herbert’s books. In Hunters and Sandworms they worked for thinking machines but it wasn’t necessary. They could have done almost all they did in those books on their own. I think that was the plan. Plague and Face Dancer felt like proper challenge when they hit same time. Without deus ex machina from thinking machines there should have been other solution to defeat them.
Honored Matres were probably closest to Frank Herbert’s plan in Hunters and Sandworms. They felt most like Frank Herbert in those books. Changing them escaping from plague and/or Face Dancers wouldn’t have changed much. You could have had same history and big moments for them.
Ithaca’s crew would probably had met Handles. I assume worms on ship were supposed to be the solution to detect Face Dancers. They detected one which helped them detect other saboteur. Duncan Idaho was probably planned to be part of the solution. Probably not similar super being as in Sandworms.
If you took away thinking machines and ghoulas of first books, story would have fitted in one book. This would have cut down most of the stupidity of Hunters and Sandworms. It would also have had all the good parts.