Look, I spend half-an-hour on writing a review for every book that I read; I'm a big-time nerd. I even made my own Best-of-2022 book awards (it's January 12th of 2023 as I write this) and I picked an Author-of-the-Year. I selected Orson Scott Card since I read three of his books last year that really changed my perspective of him as an author. I realized that he's great at writing families and loves to write about guilty mass-murderers with clever worlds and gut-wrenchingly powerful scenes. I found Treason, a rewrite of a shorter novel that he wrote a year before this version came out, at a local library sale back in May and just got around to reading it. I'm glad I did since it puts a really nice cap on my dive into Card. I don't know exactly how to go through this review, since it's a weird book, but I'll do my best.

First of all, this book feels a lot like a quest-based fantasy novel. The planet of Treason has been separated from the human Republic for three-thousand years. It was founded by exiles which the Republic banished for trying to overthrow the Republic. These exiles formed different families and nations that are still represented throughout the planet. Our main character comes from a nation that specializes in genetics, while others specialize in geology or politics and whatnot. After three-thousand years some of these families have seemingly obtained fantastical powers (such as the desert people who can  move and speak to the dirt and rock that makes up the planet  or the forest people who can slow down or speed up time for themselves without affecting the rest of the world ), which no longer seems rooted to any technology. Our main character has to travel through some of these lands and it doesn't really feel like a science fiction novel. It is, of course, but you don't get that feeling all of the time. At the same time it reminds me of, say, Alan Dean Foster's Flinx/other-SF-adventure novels, which makes for a pretty interesting read.

Our main character is the heir to the Mueller throne. As geneticists, his ancestors imbued his bloodline with the ability to regenerate lost body parts extremely quickly. Sometimes this cell reproduction goes wrong and Muellers essentially become hermaphrodites which quickly grow extra limbs and mentally and physically devolve into insanity. He's sent on one last mission by his father, intelligence fathering on a nation of forest savages who have recently begun to trade something for iron with the Offworlders, just like the Muellers trade organs from the radical regeneratives in the hope that they will someday reach space. Our main character runs away and goes through another two lands as his body ravages itself. It's an epic journey, and when  the desert people cure him of his genetic degeneration , our main character journeys through more lands and gets in a war and  reunites with his father and wife before going to war with them  and... it gets epic. The scale just widens wonderfully for most of the book. The pace is better than you think it will be when reading the first parts of the book, and it's a completely different story by the end of it.

What is that different story? Well... I'm not completely sure. I wanted to rate this book a little higher, but I just couldn't with the muddled climax that occurs before the beautiful and rewarding falling action. Our main character has a big philosophical showdown with  the desert people when he wants their help to convince the Earth to swallow the 'illuser island' whole, but doing this will kill a lot of people and make the earth's horrible screams ring eternal. He talks about how Treason has to stop seeking metal from the stars because it's tearing them apart, but there's a lot of other stuff just thrown in there that... left me scratching my head. Everything that happens after, the killing and the reunion and the retirement, is memorable and emotionally impactful. It's just segwayed into very strangely . Thematically, this is similar to his novels Speaker for the Dead and Red Prophet (both of which I've read in the last year), and these topics really do it for me. It's not exactly portrayed clearly, but it's still good, and it has all of the heartbreaking weight that I expect out of Card by now.

What about other elements of fiction, like characters and prose? Well, on the character front, we don't have much more than our main character to talk about. He's a good character, but he's more of a chosen one-type than a literary masterpiece. The cast around him tends to change a lot throughout the novel, but they usually have a good backstory and realistic motivations. The prose seems a little denser than Card's usually is, although (as silly as this is gonna sound) it could be because of the font used in the St. Martin's Paperback I read this in. It's decent scenery, decent action, good dialogue, pretty digestible world-building. If you haven't figured this out by now, Card's just a good writer.

All of that being said, Treason (only) gets 8 out of 10. It's close, but I wasn't really considering a four-star rating until the last act of the book, and the really sloppy speech threw me off of a lot of the depth that this book could dig up. Still, it's a pretty good and fun read, and I'd recommend it just about any fan of science fiction or fantasy. I think a lot of different people could get a kick out of it. I do intend to read A Planet Called Treason (the original) at some point to get a better context about this novel, but as of right now, I only plan on rereading (Card-wise) Xenocide and Children of the Mind this year. It might not happen, but I probably should... we'll see. Until then, I've got a lot of other science-fiction to read, and I've gotta read everything else that's come my way. Happy reading, my friends; hope you enjoyed.

I started out sceptical and bewildered about the weirdness and gory details in the beginning, but ended up loving this strange, quirky and creative story. It's like a mix between sci-fi, fantasy and an adventure fairy tale. The pacing is great, the ideas are exploding here and there and are knit together beautifully in the end, and I went from feeling disgusted to intrigued, excited and grateful. This is a wonderful, imaginative story that stays true to its own whimsical logic and premiss, but I imagine fans of hard-core sci-fi will see a bunch of plot holes and perhaps remain sceptical. I had a great time reading it though!

So, this is just awful. To be fair, I listened to the first 30 minutes of it . . . bad voicing, bad writing. Yikes, OSC really sucked in 1979. Crazy bad. Anyway, it makes me hesitate to read any of his other early books. This was just so bad . . .

-Revisión innecesaria de una obra escrita por el autor cuando estaba comenzando a darse a conocer.-

Género. Ciencia-Ficción.

Lo que nos cuenta. Lanik Mueller debe heredar en un futuro los dominios de su reino/familia, cuyo don es la regeneración de su organismo, pero al ser diagnosticado como regenerador radical su posición social y familiar cambia totalmente. Su padre, combinando destierro, política interna y espionaje internacional, le manda a investigar cómo otra familia/reino, los Nkumai, están haciendo crecer sus dominios por la fuerza y a una velocidad alarmante. Y es que estas familias, junto a muchas otras, descienden de los hombres que la República desterró hacia ya muchos siglos al planeta Traición como castigo por conspirar contra su dominio. Novela que es una revisión y reedición de una obra del propio autor escrita nueve años antes con el nombre de “Un planeta llamado Traición”.

¿Quiere saber más de este libro, sin spoilers? Visite:

http://librosdeolethros.blogspot.com/...

When Card is good he is great (Ender's Game), but his misses are pretty bad (Homecoming Saga). This one is a miss.

Unique world, and enjoyable just for the discovery at first, but the plot felt very forced and the main character wasn't worth much; he keeps getting bailed out in extremely improbable (lucky) ways. And in doing it, he penetrates multiple "impenetrable" groups and gets handed their secrets / gains their superpowers. The first one just happens to be the thing that can fix an incurable genetic disease. I finished the book, but after a certain point I knew what was going to happen and just skimmed along to finish.

An odd and interesting story that delves into gender identity, nature, and superhuman abilities.

Re-release of Orson Scott Card’s 1979 “classic”: a tale of a radical regenerative running amok on an imprisoned planet, collecting super powers along the way and searching for redemption and significance.

Between the ages of thirteen and eighteen, I read 22 of O.S. Card's sci-fi and fantasy novels (including the five that mirror The Book of Mormon without knowing it). While Card’s plotlines do vary, unlike, say Clive Cussler (my favorite author during middle school), I grew to be aware of his deficiencies as a writer. He has certain phraseologies that he returns to far too frequently and his prose lacks sophistication. In fact, it's fairly juvenile. Also, as I got further into Card's oeuvre, I saw that as he got older, his stories became less and less exciting and his writing grew weaker. Fewer moments of action, more talking and moralizing. Sermonizing even. And it wasn't very convincing at that.

So. This novel, Treason, written early in Card's career, is his best. It's exciting, imaginative, and, for Card, deep. If you're going to read Card, which I don't highly recommend, read this and not that Ender/Alvin Maker/Homecoming crud.

Incredible. I have not read the original, but I am grateful that Card took this story and enriched it, bringing it back to life so I could enjoy it.

I want to know more about this intriguing planet of Treason and the people on it. They have amazing abilities and I hope Lanik learns them all.

The plot was somewhat predictable, but the surprises along the way made it an enjoyable read that I just could not put down.

WOW. What a wild ride. I was NOT expecting all the twists and just plain wild "abilities" is all I can say without spoilers past the back cover... It's like if you took wizard of earth sea, put it in SF on exo planet like Pern without the dragons, and sprinkled in some John Varley level whackiness.... Sooooooooooooooo good. And it's not long either, just perfect length.

I bought this book at a library sale at the recommendation of a random attendee. Lesson learned: don't take recommendations from random library book sale attendees.

Holy hell this book is dumb. How dumb? Imagine all the dick-swinging, adolescent bravado and over-done Mary-Sue-ness of your favorite Heinlen sci-fi (say, Glory Road), add in EVEN MORE overt misogyny, and this time, throw in a BUNCH of overt racism as well.

And, of course, the cover illustration (different here from the version I had, but in both cases) has nothing at all to do with anything in the goddamn story. There are no space ships, no space suits, no guns, no lasers, no hulking machinery in the desert.

But of course, I didn't discover this until I was already 10 pages in, and Card does a good enough job of keeping you wrapped up in this crap that you feel compelled to finish it. Goddamn it.

If you've read any Orson Scott Card books besides Ender's Game, you know to expect crazy things to happen. But Treason-- a reworking of the second novel Card ever wrote-- takes things to a whole new level of crazy. How crazy? Well, the hero is a mutant Highlander hermaphrodite Nazi prince, and that's before he learns earth-bending from Peter Pan. Also, the whole Nazi thing is basically only brought up in the first chapter, and is never mentioned again or otherwise resolved. Not to mention that the hero and every other character in the story are the descendants of elitist rebels marooned on a planet and forced to fight medieval wars over the scarcest resource-- iron. And the ending, which I won't spoil, gets even crazier. You can't make this stuff up... except apparently if you're Orson Scott Card.

Now, there is definitely a point to the story. But-- and here genre fans will gasp in horror-- the point is not in the science fiction. Card is (I can only assume deliberately) playing extremely fast and loose with the consistency of the story, and with all of the realistic and scientific aspects. The point is character, and specifically (because this is a Card novel) one character, the hero, Lanik Mueller. As much as it has the trappings of science fiction, Treason really uses its setting more like fantasy or even magical realism, to explore Lanik's character and identity as he asks the questions, "who am I?" and "what kind of life should I live?".

Card pretty much nails this bizarre Jungian twist on sci-fi, crafting scenes and settings as fascinating as they are disturbing. There were just two glaring weaknesses that I saw. The first is that Card doesn't take the trouble to make his literary / philosophical drift clear-- he just drops the reader in the middle of the action. The second is that the conclusion isn't particularly surprising or satisfying. In fact it's kind of painful, and not in the good, cathartic way. Maybe this was an important part of Card's point... but if so, I couldn't tell, because of the first weakness. I still found Treason interesting and even enjoyable-- Card's a great writer-- but there was something missing. It's certainly a bold and informative experiment in science fiction, but in the end it's also a failed one.

I gave the book 4 stars, so why does this get 5? The reader was pretty good, but not enough to give it another star. No, it's just a very good book & I rounded up this time because I found out a couple of things about Card over the years.

This is his second novel, which makes this quite a feat. He published 2 others the year this came out (1979?) too. That's a fantastic accomplishment. He does a great foreword in this edition, too. He's pretty religious now from what I've heard & this book seems to be a search for morality in the face of materialism, complete with Original Sin. Thankfully, there wasn't anything for his or any other religion which would have been a huge turn off.

The book wasn't without its problems, but it was a huge undertaking & is exactly what SF should be about. So, I didn't let a little bit of broken logic get in the way of my enjoyment. He laid out an unlikely scenario that made his points perfectly.

He made some great points about the evils of rulers - once the fighting is done, does the common man really care? Of course not. We just want to be left alone to live our lives. The humble pastoral setting of Humping was over the top, though. They were kind because they were poor? Please. There's nothing noble about scratching a living from the dirt & living in poverty, but the Peace Corps was an in thing back then & it was a counterpoint.

Other problems & praise:  The idea that the various families would become the masters of their chosen professions was obviously a stretch, & a single language & that a starship would still be their goal after 3000 years was kind of silly. The iron in Schwartz would have been obvious to any compass. Still, it was a great backdrop if you can just swallow that as the basis.

I loved the idea of blowing up the Ambassadors & removing temptation. Suddenly all communication with the [false] gods was removed & all men were free to find their way to their own destiny.

All told, it was a very interesting exploration of humanity. Not perfect, but certainly thought provoking, just what the best SF is all about.

Also reviewed as a paperback here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...