Ender’s series has long been one of my favorite in the sci-fi genre and that is why I am slowly working through the series long after I have moved on from most of my childhood favorites. There was something about Ender’s world - even for a reader who was most at home with the most elaborate of high fantasy and sci-fi, the subdued world of Ender had a different sort of fascination. It did not try to sell a fancy world or any fancy technology or an advanced race of humans - none of the regular tropes. It was the most human of sci-fi stories in a way - only dealing with the fundamentals, with life and death alone and with how to deal with them. True it was set in a fascinating slot to tell this story but it asked nothing of the reader, no suspension of belief, no acceptance of an distinct world, it only asked the reader to connect with Ender.

Then Uncle Orson had the brilliant idea to take this brilliant story line and merge with a rejected story from his early career and mix in all sort of mumbo-jumbo. He took the big leap that so many sci-fi authors love to take - straight into ancient hindu philosophy - which is a very tempting and logical end space for all of sci-fi. In fact, you will not find a more cogent and perfect sci-fi universe. But that is no excuse for so throughly mixing it up with a series that was going so perfectly.

Worse, just when I promised myself that I will wrap up this series with this book, Orson throws at me the most absurdly taunting sort of conclusion and then has the nerve to come along with an afterword and tell me slyly that the best way to earn more from a book is to split it in two. So bingo, please read the next one and sorry to leave you hanging. And true to the spirit of Ender, I am pretty sure I will.

5.0 stars. I was amazed by how good this book is. Speaker for the Dead is one of my all time favorite books and this book picks up right where Speaker left off. Superb characters, amazingly orginal concepts of life and the universe and intense ethical debate (Card's strong suit) highlight this exceptional novel. Highly recommended.

Nominee: Hugo Award for Best Science Fiction Novel (1992)
Nominee: Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel (1992)

Short off topic review - I often wonder when someone does something legendary did they know what they were doing was going to be epic, or did they just fluke it?

After reading this, Enders game seems more of a fluke to me, then something OSC knew would be legendary. Even more so when you hear his vile homophobic remarks and his wild conspiracies about Obama. I don't know at what point OSC came to Jesus, but this level of Christianity in this book is overwhelming, and no real counter argument is ever made to it. Especially after the mocking tone EG had to religion. I figure he must of had a revival in his life. Now I dont mind Christianity being in books, I just wish it was questioned by the semi intelligent beings in the novel. Even more so when its the only religion being brought to a planet.

I really wanted to love this series. The first books ending really meant a lot to me. (Not so much all the Mary sue'ing at the start) but the real first contact and the redemption.
The 2nd book held my interest, and I enjoyed the meeting between the piggies and Ender, but the 3rd book? meh... way too preachy.

This really needed a Editor to trim 100 pages of it, there is so much repetition of topics and convos that it gets dull re-hashing the same debates, "Is the virus a living being we could talk too?"

Xenocide (Ender's Saga, #3)by Orson Scott Card
A rather philosophical tome. Found it very interesting how an intricate debate can take place in Orson's imagination a three way species genocide and who really deserves to exist.

Human, bug and an intelligent tree. Just a thinking tree is very different on its own, let alone a tree that wants to travel into space. Orson does like to over explain but that's how he is, so far and its my second outing with him.

** spoiler alert ** How many stars do you give a book that starts off good, wanders around dully in the middle, and then becomes offensively horrible at the end? Do you average 5, 3, and 1 star? Do you give it 2 because of the overall picture? Do you give it 1 because it's doubly bad to start out promising and then mislead the reader?

I'm in the last category.

I'm 90% finished, and I think I'm not going to make it much further. I loved the first two books, but this one is sort of awful. It started out with a good mystery: who are the gods and how does this planet relate to the other, but that got resolved about 3/4 of the way through the book, somehow the struggles on Lusitania seem mostly tedious and obnoxious. All of this is fine though, all it did was impact my reading speed. Instead of chewing through the book, I read it at a casual pace. On the other hand, what happens at about 90% of the way through the book appeals only to people who have absolutely no grasp of science, or buy into that whole J.Z. Knight (the frustrated housewife who started channelling a 35000 opponent of atlantis and suddenly got rich) cult recruitment film: What the Bleep do we know?

Wow. It took me so long to finish this book after racing through the previous portion of this series. It's really too bad because Orson Scott Card's ideas are definitely worth exploring -- some of the most thought provoking and original of the ones that I have read in my limited science fiction repertoire. Card is truly one of the most brilliant writers I have had the pleasure of reading.

That said, certain portions of the book I just found to be tedious. I finally finished this only after borrowing the audio version from the library and listening to it during my commutes. Certain notes of the book were hit too many times: the constant bickering between the family on Lusitania (you know they'll eventually get their act together) and the sometimes seemingly endless discussions about the nature of philotic connections come to mind. I also find fault with the fact that it is obvious artificial intelligence and the brilliant scientists of Lusitania will solve the scientific issues faced in the book, making the buildup of suspense difficult.

Nevertheless it's worth it to read the book. What Card does would be foolhardy for most writers, but for him it works. How many writers do you know that can write convincing dialogue and philosophy for the most intelligent people to populate a planet of geniuses? I can only imagine how truly amazing this book would have been if a bit shorter and more tightly constructed.

Storyline: 1/5
Characters: 3/5
Writing Style: 3/5
World: 2/5

I'd read a lot of the Ender's Saga books several years ago and had accidentally skipped from Speaker of the Dead (#2) to Children of the Mind (#4). I realized my mistake early on in Children of the Mind, but I already had the book checked out and was at a place and in a time where it wouldn't have been easy to swap it out for Xenocide, the one I should have been reading after Speaker of the Dead. So I skipped from two to four and never felt that I suffered much from it. I've been away from the Ender books for long enough now though that I wonder if I would think of them the same way I had before. I've read a lot more science fiction in the time since, and I was curious what I'd think of Card now. So I went back to fill in this gap and see how the Enderverse impresses me now.

There's a lot to like about Orson Scott Card and Ender's Saga. Card shows here that he is a very capable writer, very diligent and careful to make things clear. His writing is not flowery, but it is very effective at conveying the emotions, conflicts, or questions of concern. The characters are realized, many of them frustratingly so because he calls forth very flawed personalities and traits in what are otherwise good people. He directly confronts a lot of philosophical or ethical themes centering on justice and injustice. This is also a book that conveys a love of science fiction, using science to expand the horizons of human civilization and trying to ground that science in reality, goading the reader to will it plausible. This, then, is a carefully written and contemplative science fiction.

There's a lot to dislike about Xenocide as well. Card is never one to be hurried, always organized and with a plan to explain everything and to readers of every reading level. The writing, as a consequence, is oftentimes plodding, character attributes or the stakes of a situation laboriously constructed when far simpler expositions would have been just as effective. It is easy to pick up the books and read them in any order because Card is careful to include enough backstory and explanation of past events to help new readers. For old readers, however, this slows the pace even further. There were also a few too many dislikeable characters in the story. I appreciate flawed, complex characters, but you can only have so many before it becomes cumbersome to try to relate to and empathize with them. The ethical themes and dilemmas Card constructs, too, are too numerous and too big to adequately consider. Card does a great job situating the philosophical problems in real social situations with crises where decisions will have truly significant effects. There's no climax, clarity, or resolutions to these dilemmas, though, not even a firm conclusion that they're irresolvable. Card deftly sketches the terms of the debate and the importance of the problems and solutions, but one is simply exhausted at the end of it and left feeling that nothing was learned or accomplished. The science fiction problem-solving was the same way. Detailed, very easy to read discussions of the scientific or metaphysical properties at work, but at some point you wonder if it is worth all the effort to elaborately comprehend something that is so obviously fantastical. If the negatives can be summed in a word it would be laborious.

I wonder if Card stand-alone novels would be any better. Everything I've read by him has been part of a series, and he moseys through the telling knowing that he has another book (or two or five) afterward where he can bring things together or get to the exciting parts of the story. Card remains an author I wouldn't avoid but neither would I aggressively seek out.

*Spoilers a cascoporro, leer bajo tu responsabilidad*
Nota: 4’5-5 (solo porque soy reticente a poner cincos a la brava)

Madre mía. Qué experiencia. Creo que nunca había leído algo parecido.
Si leéis mi reseña sobre el primer libro de la colección se puede apreciar una evolución IMPRESIONANTE. Como ya dije en el anterior libro, este junto con el segundo, bien podrían haber sido independientes, pero es que el primer libro era muy necesario y yo he necesitado un tiempo de maduración para darme cuenta. Desde lo personal, entiendo que a la gente no le haya gustado mucho porque es un libro muy bueno como forma de escapismo, pero para los que no sean tan fans del autor que relfexiona para sí mismo en las novelas, obviamente, esta diserción es por decir algo, presuntuosa (aunque hay grandes momentos como cuando los humanos atacan a los pequeninos y éstos luego les perdonan porque saben que no todos son iguales). A mí ha habido momentos de no poder despegar los ojos del libro o en momentos de ansiedad o angustia estirar el brazo para sumergirme de nuevo en Lusitania. También opino que como libro de autoexploración es maravilloso, a mí me ha hecho pensar mucho, y aunque no estoy de acuerdo en algunas cosas está muy bien como ‘libro que habla solo’. Cabe decir que me ha encantado de todas maneras porque habla de problemas cotidianos pero con naves espaciales y alienígenas.

Poniendome ya en plan específico, voy a empezar por lo más fácil: Ender y Novinha. No sé si es porque estoy muy entrenada en novela de romance trasnochado, pero no tienen ningún momento que te haga quererlos como pareja. Novinha desde luego cae mal todo el libro, y me he encontrado en algunos puntos deseando que la mataran (lo siento, mi mente sádica), el hecho de que encima odiara a la estupenda y magnífica Jane me supera, para sumarle un plus. La separación me ha dado, para qué engañarnos, igual. Lo único que me ha gustado de esto ha sido cuando Ender pierde un poco los estribos. Pareja con potencial malgastado.

Y hablando de romaces, por el otro lado tenemos Jakt-Valentine que me han dado mucho en lo que pensar. Almas gemelas que si no fuera por todo lo vivido nunca se hubieran conocido, separados por más de dos mil años. Son monísimos que prácticamente la imagen idónea del amor. ÉL RENUNCIA AL MAR POR ELLA. Es que es todo maravilloso y me encantan.

Luego, el que los capítulos empiecen con conversación pequenino-insector es genial, súper ingenioso. Tienen citas verdaderamente bonitas, pero sin lugar a dudas mi favorita es cuando hablan de cómo los humanos soñamos. Todo muy lacrimógeno, aunque deberían ver qué sueños son los que tenemos JAJAJAJA.

Miro. Miro mi marido. Qué buen personaje. Ela casi me gusta tanto como él, pero es que creo que después de Olhado (ME POSTRO ANTE TI) es mi personaje favorito. Le dice las cosas claras a la gente y al final se sale con la suya, tener un cuerpo nuevo (y aunque sea una meta muy superficial en verdad conlleva otras miles de ventajas además de volver a ser el de antes).

La trama pues qué voy a decir: ESPECTACULAR. Aunque los habitantes de Sendero fueran un poco ‘porculeros’, de esos hay hasta en Lusitania (cof, Grego, cof, Quara). Lo de la descolada es impresionante y lo de los dioses generados por el DOC me parece otro nivel de sátira.

Tema Quim, en fin. Lloro. Pero ya me estoy acostumbrando, Nehemia está reciente todavía y ya me las veo venir a kilómetros. En cuanto un personaje que antes era ‘meh’ y ahora es ‘TE QUIERO’ lo van a matar. Y es una pena, porque Quim ya estaba diciendo verdades a Miro y estaba empezando el ‘healing arch’ lo cual lo hacía todavía más ‘querible’. Su muerte fue muy triste y me dio mucha pena porque había logrado madurar ya y todo, uno de los mejores Ribeira (aunque eso es fácil porque jodo, menuda familia).

Bueno, BUENO. Peter 2.0 y Valentine malrollera. Qué miedo. JAJAJAJJA, es que menudo momentazo Ender en plan ‘oh shit’. Peter por supuesto a su bola dando por culo, pero qué se le va a hacer (tremendo rizz que tiene, también te digo, ¿eso también es tuyo, Ender? Cómo se liga a la Wang-mu).

Y por último menciones especiales: Valentine, Ela, Plikt y Olhado. Mis protegidos. Todos han tocado y hundido nervios míos durante la lectura. Olhado en especial, con su charla con Valentine sobre Ender y cómo se llaman ‘padre’ e ‘hijo’. ¿Quién pudiera ser Jacqueline?

Pedazo libro.

Ten times better than a novel with this title should be; I finally get it. It is rammed full of religion but has even more real philosophy in it. It starts slow, but by p.150 the long philosophical dialogues flourish even as Card juggles six concurrent plot lines. He does the old great arguments about the greater good, political legitimacy, consciousness, metaethics, moral patiency, communitarianism, religion, embodiment, existentialism, freedom, a sort of game theory. Card is perfectly able to write good justified atheists, which implies something about his own faith. It takes a subtle Christian to write about a religion which is an explicitly engineered conspiratorial tool of social control. (Yes yes, he also solves its plot holes with faster-than-light metaphysical idealism, hippie oneness the long way round ("all philotic twining is willed"). But you don't need to accept a conclusion to admire an argument.)

Highly quotable:

n  "Human beings do metamorphose. They change their identity constantly. However, each new identity thrives on the delusion that it was always in possession of the body it has just conquered."
"Such changes are superficial. The nature of the organism remains the same. Humans are very proud of their changes, but every imagined transformation turns out to be a new set of excuses for behaving exactly as the individual has always behaved."


She had always thought that if only people could communicate mind-to-mind, eliminating the ambiguities of language, then understanding would be perfect and there'd be no more needless conflicts. Instead she had discovered that rather than magnifying differences between people, language might just as easily soften them, minimize them, smooth things over so that people could get along even though they really didn't understand each other. The illusion of comprehension allowed people to think they were more alike than they really were. Maybe language was better.

Collectively, they're a collection of dolts. But in all their scurrying around and pretending to be wise, throwing out idiotic half-understood theories about this and that, one or two of them will come up with some idea that is just a little bit closer to the truth than what was already known. And in a sort of fumbling trial and error, about half the time the truth actually rises to the top and becomes accepted by people who still don't understand it, who simply adopt it as a new prejudice to be trusted blindly until the next dolt accidentally comes up with an improvement... no one is ever individually intelligent, and groups are even stupider than individuals-- and yet by keeping so many fools engaged in pretending to be intelligent, they still come up with some of the same results that an intelligent species would come up with.

What he forgot was the way pious people had always reacted to insults against their god.

"Even the martyrs of Christianity and Islam were willing to accept rewards in heaven for their sacrifice,” said Valentine.
“Then they were all selfish pigs..."

She was a child of manual workers, and her hands, not her mind, held her future. Philosophy was as far above her as the sky was above the earth. "But the sky only seems to be far away from you," said Master Han, when she told him this. "Actually it is all around you. You breathe it in and you breathe it out, even when you labor with your hands in the mud. That is true philosophy."

I have tasted the heat of many stars, and all of them were sweet.n

Its philosophical moves are classic in the good (erudite) and bad (pre-modern) sense. Authenticity, essence, metaphysics, will, creativity as stamp of divinity:

n  "If I can't think original thoughts, does that mean that I'm nothing but a computer program that got out of hand?"n

Everyone is in severe need of a notion of expected value ("you have no idea whether finding out what you are in order to save you will help or hurt those other projects").

This passage was the first time I caught him making a howler, 360 pages in:

n  "Even if there is no such thing as free will, we have to treat each other as if there were free will in order to live together in society. Because otherwise, every time somebody does something terrible, you can't punish him, because he can't help it, because his genes or his environment or God made him do it, and every time somebody does something good, you can't honor him, because he was a puppet, too. If you think that everybody around you is a puppet, why bother talking to them at all? Why even try to plan anything or create anything, since everything you plan or create or desire or dream of is just acting out the script your puppeteer built into you."n

This is a failure of imagination. Retribution is probably not in fact necessary to a society (while quarantine and rehabilitation are). Determinists can benefit from and suffer from all the usual evaluative stances towards their fellows and their own life; for instance I do.

But no matter: there are very few novelists who can handle philosophy this well, who can make ideas feel as important as they are, who can make the development of ideas a source of suspense as strong as a rapacious virus and a planet-killer.

Card is much concerned with maximally passionate characters with tragically differing aims, so there are lots of flatly irrational moves despite its buckets of wisdom. Novinha in particular; I don't begrudge someone overpowering emotion, but it's hard to sympathise when they lose all proportion and fairness and compassion for weeks afterward. He really doesn't do enough to establish Quim's greatness; in fact I think there's exactly one scene where he's shown turning the other cheek and dispensing hard truths before he's killed. Qingdao is a great brilliant irrationalist: an eloquent and extended demonstration that intelligence and rationality can come apart. (She is also a wonderful portrayal of tragically partial success at overcoming classism.) And her dad is a master rationalist, who actually moves with the world.

There's a background hum of difference in it: Card's old-fashioned values / not being PC. His planet of so-called Daoists (actually fideist Legalists) may strike some as unconscionably orientalist, because unlike a lot of intentionally diverse portrayals, it portrays an actually different (inegalitarian) culture, with service and social stability taking precedence over all else.

n  First the gods. Second the ancestors. Third the people. Fourth the rulers. Last the self... we serve the rulers: because they serve the people, who serve the ancestors, who serve the gods... Fathers always decide everything... That's the beginning of wisdom.n

But note that the text pre-empts this.

Donkeys, sedan chairs, all these trappings of ancient China--do the godspoken really think that such affectations make them somehow holier? Why don't they simply ride on fliers and hovercars like honest people do on every other world? Then Mu-pao would not have to humiliate herself, bouncing and jouncing on an animal that is suffering under her weight.

The rigid hierarchy of Path's eugenic Daoism is imposed on them by the evil empire. The orientalism is then not Card's but Congress's. I liked his cute fabricated idea of "ancestor-of-the-heart".

He's impressed with gender differences and the simple evo theory thereof.

n  Our great civilizations are nothing more than social machines to create the ideal female setting, where a woman can count on stability; our legal and moral codes that try to abolish violence and promote permanence of ownership and enforce contracts -- those represent the primary female strategy, the taming of the male.n

A bitter, traumatised character says "Didn't you ever think I needed somebody to jolly me out of it sometimes?" which strikes me as cool and contrarian at this point. Card's conservatism is not the obvious kind, of abortions, guns, and America first, so maybe it won't strike many this way.

In praise of abstinence:

n  Valentine had long ago observed that in a society that expected chastity and fidelity, like Lusitania, the adolescents who controlled and channeled their youthful passions were the ones who grew up to be both strong and civilized. Adolescents in such a community who were either too weak to control themselves or too contemptuous of society's norms to try usually ended up being either sheep or wolves - either mindless members of the herd or predators who took what they could and gave nothing.n

(The key caveat, which transforms the passage IMO, is "that expected chastity".)

Sick fundamentalism on Path:

n  And it is certainly not up to us to decide whether it should exist--the gods have decreed that such a thing is possible and can exist."
"So Demosthenes was right. The [genocide weapon] is with the fleet."
"Yes."
"And the government files that Demosthenes published--they were genuine."
"Yes."
"But Father--you joined many others in claiming that they were forgeries."
"Just as the gods speak only to a chosen few, so the secrets of the rulers must be known only to those who will use the knowledge properly. Demosthenes was giving powerful secrets to people who were not fit to use them wisely, and so for the good of the people those secrets had to be withdrawn. The only way to retrieve a secret, once it is known, is to replace it with a lie; then the knowledge of the truth is once again your secret... he wishes to take power out of the hands of those whom the gods have ordained to rule humankind. What would happen to the people if they rejected the rulers given them by the gods?" n

Valentine is portrayed as a wise "angel" and a moral philosopher but actually she seems pretty naive to me, of the old unilateral-disarmament clean-hands school.

n  "What matters is -- should they blow up Lusitania?"
"What kind of person are you?" asked Valentine. He could hear both awe and loathing in her voice.
"You tell me. Are we supposed to love the [contagious aliens] so much that we allow the virus they carry to destroy all of humanity?"
..."I choose to live in a universe that has some hope in it... It's wrong to even contemplate..."n

But Card can write her and Miro the bullet-biting consequentialist, and sympathise where I cannot. I start to wonder if he's really a theist, seeing the many pathologies of religion clearly as he does - and what greater compliment can I give his writing?

I'm interested whether you could enjoy this without having read books 1 and 2; volunteers welcome.

3.5 ⭐️. A bit of a mixed bag. Some great moments and concepts, tempered with frustrating characters and odd narrative choices. Hoping for a solid, more cohesive story in the next book.

8.5/10

Continuing on the storyline that the Speaker for the Dead began, bringing a much different tone than the first book and showing another aspect in his series, Orson Scott Card delves in Xenocide, the third volume of the Ender Saga and the second instalment of the Speaker trilogy, deeper into the mysteries of his universe, taking us in a story of godspoken, scientists, priests, alien species and artificial intelligences; but also of faith and purpose, freedom and manipulation, and salvation and annihilation, in a profound, philosophical novel.

Thirty years have passed since the rebellion of Lusitania, and the difficult decisions they had to take. But now, with the Starways Congress – fearing that history will repeat itself – to have sent a fleet armed with the most deadly weapon in human history, planning to destroy a whole planet and save mankind from an unspeakable peril, Lusitania’s time is running out, bringing its inhabitants closer and closer to their annihilation and the end of all life on the planet...

But Valentine, now in her fifties, having given up her life on Trondheim and embarked with all her family on a voyage towards Lusitania and Ender, has been reading over her report of the ironic dismemberment of the personal character of the chairman of the cabinet of the Starways Congress.

Approached by her husband, Jakt, in her tiny office, tantalizing her with unsatisfied desires and reminding her the sacrifices that her subversive propagandas under the identity of Demosthenes have required from their marriage, Valentine and her family will head to their rendezvous with Ender’s stepson, Miro, before getting back again on their course, and the last leg of their voyage.

Nevertheless, with the xenobiologists of Lusitania during their time-dilating voyage to have entered in a contest with the Descolada virus, trying unsuccessfully to develop a new strain and inhibit its devastating effect on the people of the colony, when she reunites with Ender – now thirty years older than the last time she saw him – just a year before the fleet comes into range, and she sees on him the signs she had seen only once before in the past, Valentine will find herself on a new, unknown world, putting her into its problems and its imminent dangers.

At the same time on the world of Path, Qing-jao, daughter of Han Fei-tzu and most honoured statesman among the nobles, having been born in the family of the house of Han and taught since a young child to follow the Path and the mandate of heaven, has been hearing the voices of the gods.

But, with the Lusitania Fleet one day to have mysteriously disappeared as from thin air, breaking off suddenly communication with the rest of humanity and leaving a total absence of evidence of its cause, when her father sets her an impossible task on behalf of the Starways Congress, and she comes – after thoroughly tracking down and crossing out all other possibilities – to the only logical explanation, Qing-jao will find herself before an inconceivable truth, bringing her in conflict with everything that she grew to believe in.

Meanwhile, Miro, taking a thirty-year voyage to get away and coming back to a world much changed from the one he knew, will long for a miracle; Ender, starting a new life with Novinha and her children and making a family with them, will try to find solutions to Lusitania’s problems; Jane, living between the philotic web that binds the ansible together and observing everything that happens on the human worlds, will face her most dangerous enemy; and Wang-mu, growing up in the lower social classes of Path and grabbing the chance to become Qing-jao’s secret maid, will find purpose in her life.

However, with the impossible problems facing them to have brought their lives and their societies upside down, turning their beliefs and their hard work against them and stirring up trouble between them, when the Lusitania Fleet – returning to its course – continues to approach its destination, and all their endeavours to neutralize the Descolada virus lead to an impasse, they will be faced with the end of everything they knew, bringing them before the very purpose of their existence – a purpose which, if they let Congress have its way and cause an irrevocable harm, could cost them their only hope of salvation.

Moving on to the next chapter of the Ender Saga, continuing the threads that the Speaker for the Dead left open and bringing the series one step before its conclusion, Orson Scott Card brings the story a few decades forward, taking us in Xenocide back to Lusitania, where the colonists, the pequeninos and the buggers – now restored to their previous position in the universe – have lived in a seeming harmony with each other, restricting their societies to their own exclusive territories, and spending their years under the threat of annihilation; but also to the world of Path, where the colonists of a Chinese culture – dedicated to preserving the old religions – have created through a genetic difference a superior intellectual ability from ordinary people, following by their faith the mandate of heaven, and communing with the gods by their rituals of purification.

A third novel in which Card, continuing in the same tone as the Speaker for the Dead, addressing again the moral questions of his universe and giving to his writing a greater gravitas, examines in depth the soul of humankind, of the pequeninos, of the buggerss, as well as all sentient beings, creating a profound philosophical story like none of his previous ones.

A novel which, combining together different cultures, peoples and species, bringing to the forefront their very beliefs and the core of their imprinted mechanisms of their genes, come between the struggle of theology and biology, looking into the soul of his characters, as well as the mysteries of his universe, and crafting a story that – despite some quite implausible and far-fetched concepts – shows the scope of his imagination, managing to bring them all wonderful together and to leave also other threads open for the next and final book, Children of the Mind.

In sum, Xenocide is a deep philosophical novel, with Orson Scott Card – continuing in the same tone as the previous one – coming between theology and biology, looking in depth his characters and his universe, and crafting through its moral aspects a much more profound story that has yet much more to tell.



*Ελληνική κριτική:
Συνεχίζοντας στην ιστορία που το Speaker for the Dead ξεκίνησε, φέρνοντας ένα πολύ πιο διαφορετικό τόνο από το πρώτο βιβλίο και δείχνοντας μια άλλη πτυχή στη σειρά του, ο Orson Scott Card εμβαθύνει στο Xenocide, τον τρίτο τόμο του Έπους του Ender και το δεύτερο μέρος της τριλογίας του Speaker, περισσότερο στα μυστήρια του σύμπαντός του, πηγαίνοντάς μας σε μια ιστορία θεομιλούμενων, επιστημόνων, ιερέων, εξωγήινων ειδών και τεχνητών νοημοσυνών· αλλά και πίστης και σκοπού, ελευθερίας και χειραγώγησης, και σωτηρίας και αφανισμού, σε ένα βαθυστόχαστο, φιλοσοφικό μυθιστόρημα.

Τριάντα χρόνια έχουν περάσει από την επανάσταση της Lusitania, και τις δύσκολες αποφάσεις που έπρεπε να πάρουν. Κι όμως τώρα, με το Αστρικό Κογκρέσο –φοβούμενο ότι η ιστορία θα επαναληφθεί– να έχει στείλει ένα στόλο οπλισμένο με το πιο θανατηφόρο όπλο στην ανθρώπινη ιστορία, σχεδιάζοντας να καταστρέψει έναν ολόκληρο πλανήτη και να σώσει την ανθρωπότητα από έναν ανείπωτο κίνδυνο, ο χρόνος της Lusitania τελειώνει, φέρνοντας τους κατοίκους της όλο και πιο κοντά στον αφανισμό τους και το τέλος όλης της ζωής στον πλανήτη...

Αλλά η Valentine, πλέον στα πενήντα της, έχοντας εγκαταλείψει τη ζωή της στον Trondheim και ξεκινήσει με όλη την οικογένειά της σε ένα ταξίδι προς την Lusitania και τον Ender, επανεξετάζει την έκθεσή της του ειρωνικού διαμελισμού του προσωπικού χαρακτήρα του προέδρου του συμβουλίου του Αστρικού Κογκρέσου.

Προσεγγιζόμενη από τον άντρα της, Jakt, στο μικροσκοπικό γραφείο της, βασανίζοντάς την με ανικανοποίητους πειρασμούς και θυμίζοντάς της τις θυσίες που οι ανατρεπτικές προπαγάνδες της υπό την ταυτότητα του Δημοσθένη έχουν απαιτήσει από το γάμο τους, η Valentine και η οικογένειά της θα κατευθυνθούν στη προκαθορισμένη συνάντησή τους με τον θετό γιο του Ender, Miro, πριν επιστρέψουν πάλι στην πορεία τους, και το τελευταίο σκέλος του ταξιδιού τους.

Παρ’ όλα αυτά, με τους ξενοβιολόγους της Lusitania κατά τη διάρκεια του χρονοδιαστελλόμενου ταξιδιού τους να έχουν εισέλθει σε έναν αγώνα με τον ιό της Descolada, προσπαθώντας ανεπιτυχώς να αναπτύξουν ένα νέο γένος και να εμποδίσουν την καταστροφική του επίδραση στους ανθρώπους της αποικίας, όταν επανασυνδεθεί με τον Ender –πλέον τριάντα χρονών μεγαλύτερος από την τελευταία φορά που το είδε– μόλις ένα χρόνο πριν ο στόλος έρθει σε εμβέλεια, και δει πάνω του τα σημάδια που είχε δει μονάχα άλλη μια φορά στο παρελθόν, η Valentine θα βρεθεί σε ένα νέο, άγνωστο κόσμο, βάζοντάς την μέσα στα προβλήματα και τους επικείμενους κινδύνους του.

Συγχρόνως στον κόσμο του Path, η Qing-jao, κόρη του Han Fei-tzu και του πιο τιμημένου πολιτικού ανάμεσα στους ευγενείς, έχοντας γεννηθεί στην οικογένεια του οίκου των Han και διδαχτεί από μικρή να ακολουθεί το Μονοπάτι και την εντολή του ουρανού, ακούει τις φωνές των θεών.

Όμως, με τον Στόλο της Lusitania μια μέρα να έχει εξαφανιστεί μυστηριωδώς σαν από το πουθενά, διακόπτοντας ξαφνικά την επικοινωνία με την υπόλοιπη ανθρωπότητα και αφήνοντας παντελή απουσία στοιχείων για την αιτία του, όταν ο πατέρας της της θέσει ένα αδύνατο έργο εκ μέρους του Αστρικού Κογρέσου, και έρθει –αφότου ενδελεχώς εντοπίσει και διασταυρώσει όλες τις άλλες πιθανότητες– στη μόνη λογική εξήγηση, η Qing-jao θα βρεθεί ενώπιον μιας αδιανόητης αλήθειας, φέρνοντάς την σε σύγκρουση με όλα όσα μεγάλωσε να πιστεύει.

Εντωμεταξύ, ο Miro, παίρνοντας ένα ταξίδι τριάντα χρόνων για να ξεφύγει και επιστρέφοντας σε έναν κόσμο πολύ αλλαγμένο από αυτόν που ήξερε, θα λαχταρήσει για ένα θαύμα· ο Ender, ξεκινώντας μια νέα ζωή με την Novinha και τα παιδιά της και φτιάχνοντας μια οικογένεια μαζί τους, θα προσπαθήσει να βρει λύσεις στα προβλήματα της Lusitania· η Jane, ζώντας ανάμεσα στο φιλοτικό δίκτυο που δένει τα ansible μαζί και παρατηρώντας τα πάντα που γίνονται στους ανθρώπινους κόσμους, θα έρθει αντιμέτωπη με τον πιο επικίνδυνο εχθρό της· και η Wang-mu, μεγαλώνοντας στις χαμηλότερες κοινωνικές τάξεις του Path και αρπάζοντας την ευκαιρία να γίνει η μυστική υπηρέτρια της Qing-jao, θα βρει σκοπό στη ζωή της.

Ωστόσο, με τα αδύνατα προβλήματα που τους αντιμετωπίζουν να έχουν φέρει τις ζωές τους και τις κοινωνίες τους άνω κάτω, μεταστρέφοντας τα πιστεύω τους και τη σκληρή δουλειά τους εναντίων τους και δημιουργώντας εντάσεις μεταξύ τους, όταν ο Στόλος της Lusitania –επιστρέφοντας στην πορεία του– συνεχίσει να πλησιάζει στον προορισμό του, και όλες οι προσπάθιές τους για να εξουδετερώσουν τον ιό της Descolada οδηγήσουν σε αδιέξοδο, θα έρθουν αντιμέτωποι με το τέλος όλων όσων ήξεραν, φέρνοντάς τους ενώπιον με τον ίδιο τον σκοπό της ύπαρξής τους – ένας σκοπός ο οποίος, αν αφήσουν το Κογκρέσο να περάσει το δικό του και να προκαλέσει αμετάκλητο κακό, θα μπορούσε να κοστίσει την μοναδική τους ελπίδα για σωτηρία.

Προχωρώντας στο επόμενο κεφάλαιο του Έπους του Ender, συνεχίζοντας τα νήματα που το Speaker for the Dead άφησε ανοιχτά και φέρνοντας τη σειρά ένα βήμα πριν την ολοκλήρωσή της, ο Orson Scott Card φέρνει την ιστορία μερικές δεκαετίες εμπρός, πηγαίνοντάς μας στο Xenocide πίσω στην Lusitania, εκεί όπου τώρα οι άποικοι, τα pequeninos και τα ζωύφια –αποκαταστημένα στην προηγούμενη θέση τους στο σύμπαν– έχουν ζήσει σε μια φαινομενική αρμονία μεταξύ τους, περιορίζοντας τις κοινωνίες στις δικές τους αποκλειστικές περιοχές, και περνώντας τα χρόνια τους υπό την απειλή του αφανισμού· αλλά και στο κόσμο του Path, εκεί όπου οι άποικοι μιας Κινεζικής κουλτούρας –αφιερωμένοι στο να διατηρούν τις παλαιές θρησκείες– έχουν δημιουργήσει μέσω μιας γενετικής διαφοράς μια ανώτερη διανοούμενη ικανότητα από τους απλούς ανθρώπους, ακολουθώντας από την πίστη τους την εντολή του ουρανού, και επικοινωνώντας με τους θεούς από τις τελετουργίες κάθαρσής τους.

Ένα τρίτο μυθιστόρημα στο οποίο ο Card, συνεχίζοντας στον ίδιο τόνο με το Speaker for the Dead, απευθύνοντας ξανά τα ηθικά ερωτήματα του σύμπαντός του και δίνοντας στη γραφή του μια μεγαλύτερη βαρύτητα, εξετάζει εις βάθος την ψυχή της ανθρωπότητας, των pequeninos, των ζωυφίων, όπως και όλων των αισθανόμενων υπάρξεων, δημιουργώντας μια βαθυστόχαστη φιλοσοφική ιστορία όπως καμία από τις προηγούμενές του.

Ένα μυθιστόρημα το οποίο, συνδυάζοντας μαζί διαφορετικές κουλτούρες, λαούς και είδη, φέρνοντας στο προσκήνιο τα ίδια τα πιστεύω τους και την καρδιά των αποτυπωμένων μηχανισμών των γονιδίων τους, μπαίνει ανάμεσα στην πάλη θεολογίας και βιολογίας, κοιτάζοντας μέσα στην ψυχή των χαρακτήρων του, όπως επίσης και στα μυστήρια του σύμπαντός του, και φτιάχνοντας μια ιστορία που –παρά μερικών αρκετά ανεύλογων και παράλογων ιδεών– δείχνει το εύρος της φαντασίας του, καταφέρνοντας να τα φέρει όλα υπέροχα μαζί και να αφήσει επίσης και άλλα νήματα ανοιχτά για το επόμενο και τελευταίο βιβλίο, Children of the Mind.

Με λίγα λόγια, το Xenocide είναι βαθύ φιλοσοφικό μυθιστόρημα, με τον Orson Scott Card –συνεχίζοντας στον ίδιο τόνο με το προηγούμενο– να μπαίνει ανάμεσα στη θεολογία και βιολογία, κοιτάζοντας εις βάθος τους χαρακτήρες του και το σύμπαν του, και φτιάχνοντας μέσα από ηθικές πτυχές της μια πολύ πιο βαθυστόχαστη ιστορία από πριν που έχει ακόμα πολλά περισσότερα για να πει.

So far, the first 3 books in the ender saga have been very different and I’m not a huge fan of the change. The first book was more sci fi/ adventure but the series has moved to be more philosophical. There is also more about religion and physics. Overall, it’s just a more complicated read. The book was also really long so it took me a long time to get through it. It wasn’t particularly exciting as there weren't really any moments of suspense and the story felt like it was dragged out. I think it would have been better if some scenes were cut or some of the long philosophical ramblings were cut.
1 thing that hasn’t changed between the 3 books is the great world building. It is really easy to see what everywhere looks like. This is one of the books where the complicated environment somehow never becomes confusing. Orson Scott Card is incredible at this.
This book had the same characters as the last with the addition of a couple more. The characters were all older in this book and I did like the way they all turned out pretty much how you would expect. I liked Wang Mu a lot. She was really what kept me reading this book.
It felt like this book was aimed at an older audience than Enders game so it wasn’t really the sort of book I usually enjoy reading. I’m not sure I will continue to read the Enders game books.