Ironwood must flow - similarities with Dune
To all of you who are also familiar with Frank Herbert's Dune. (Those who don't and intend to read it one day might be wary of spoilers here)
The more I think about it... Not saying there's exact matches but some similarities are so striking it's funny. The whole thing is more for fun than for serious purpose, now that the disclaimer is made :
Two houses with a story of mutual hatred, the Atreides/Forresters and the Harkonnen/Whitehills, at war for the control of the most valuable resource in the known world : Spice Melange/Ironwood.
Atreides/Forresters :
Duke Leto/Lord Gregor (same early tragic fate in the story) ; Lady Elissa/Lady Jessica ; Alia/Talia
Royland = Gurney Halleck (the House's skilled Swordmaster) ; Maester Ortengryn = both the Mentat Thufir Hawat and Doctor Yueh (...who was the traitor if you remember) ; Duncan Tuttle/Duncan Idaho
Paul Atreides would be a mixture of all Forrester male heirs (Ethan = young Paul ; Asher = Muad'Dib in the desert trying to get himself an army of Fremen ; Rodrik = broken Muad'Dib with a handicap near the end?), also Gared Tuttle on his journey to the Northern Grove to unlock its mysterious powers = Paul on his path to control the powers of the Kwisatz Haderach. (Okay the analogies get extremely far-fetched here, but it's all for fun's sake.)
Harkonnen/Whitehills :
Baron Vladimir/Ludd (fat pig with ridiculous haircut) ; Feyd-Rautha/Gryff (mad-doggish heir desperate for recognition)
Has any other knower of Dune thought of this before ? I find the comparison quite amusing.
In any case I love some name resemblances - Elissa/Jessica and Talia/Alia are striking IMO.