Use the Spice, Paul

Dune, by Frank Herbert.
The cover hails it as "Science Fiction's Supreme Masterpiece" and that was enough to sell me. Also, the book felt nice in my hands, which is important on the "to buy, or not to buy" test. On the cover is a long stretch of sand seen overhead, with two figures walking toward the top of the image. My eye creates a classic Cardinal direction orientation of the scene, so the characters look as if they're walking North. That being said, their long shadows stretch into the East, planting the setting sun (Al-Lat) in the West. The West plays an important role representing death in some societies, that may not have been considered in the production of the cover, but it fits.
This is the first I've ever read Herbert and would read more, but for now I must resist sinking back into the Dune legacy. The story is epic, and the world it has bred has a grandeur all its own. The characters are fantastic but believable, much of their development takes place in the writings of Princes Irulan, that are used as chapter markers.
The pacing is slow and deliberate, the events of the story take place within a four year time span, but the characters change so much within that time that it seems a lot more time has passed when the "man-child" Paul becomes Muad'Dib. And the reader is treated to the perspectives of several characters, jumping between thoughts of the antagonists and protagonists from paragraph to paragraph, sorry, no Ender's Shadow here.
This book may be long but I don't think Herbert needlessly explains everything for the reader, after all, a glossary is provided. His writing style reminds me somewhat of the tempo that takes place in comic books. The action that the eye creates in between the panels of a comic is as important as the panels themselves, there hides the explanatory motion. So, in my mind the final battle between the Fremen and the Houses may prove to be very climatic, the wording of the thing is less so.
There are elements in this book that Star Wars has borrowed from, and that may be putting it lightly...ok, Lucas ransacked Herbert like the Wachowski Brothers ransacked Gibson. Maybe the book hasn't enjoyed the commercial success as Lucas's ventures because there aren't any heroes to slap on comforters and towels. Remember: Luke Skywalker didn't use the skin of his enemies as drum heads.
As for Science Fiction's Supreme Masterpiece? For me, a book would have to have "Asimov" on it somewhere to make that claim.