An enraged and brilliant Achilles kidnaps Petra, and Bean must find her. This Shadow episode takes place entirely on Earth (a first for the series) and is a nail-biter from start to finish. Bean finally learns about his real origins at a high personal cost. Peter finally becomes Hegemon, but we only learn about him from the emails going back and forth during the book. I wonder if we will ever be inside Peter's head as we were a bit with his counterpart in Children of the Mind. I liked this book and it is keeping me engaged to finish the 5-book series.

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Left me wanting more. It feels action packed but it's not, it's more exciting and always building up to events that make it really fun.

breh

10/10. Media de los 43 libros leídos del autor : 8/10

43 obras que me he leído de Card y media de 8/10. Tela. Creo que eso lo dice todo, y liarme a hacer alabanzas de este autor es superfluo.

Aquí comienza la Saga de Bean, el amigo de Ender en la escuela de batalla. Que tb era un genio pero quedó eclipsado por Ender.
Y eso mismo le ha pasado a esta saga paralela: que para mi gusto es más entretenida de leer y más adictiva que la de Ender, todo basado en personajes fantásticos con los que empatizas y no puedes parar de leer.
Los dos primeros se llevaron un 10 redondo. El tercero, un 9. Tela.

Not nearly as ambitious as Ender's Game or Speaker for the Dead, or even Ender's Shadow, but just as well done. There's nothing Earth-shatteringly poetic or profound, it's just good clean fun. And what fun it is, featuring political intrigue, nonstop action, and always intelligent, occasionally hilarious dialogue. Needless to say, I enjoyed this entry in the Ender series immensely, and found myself wishing that I had found it years ago. Thirteen-year-old me would have eaten this up.

Despite what I said about Hegemon being unambitious, it is in fact as important to the genre as it is enjoyable. Science fiction writers in the last decade or two have given up almost entirely on the idea of writing about the near future -- the premise upon which Sci-Fi was originally based. This is purportedly because modern technology is changing so quickly that attempting to make any predictions about what might happen in the near future seems futile -- by the time a book is published, it's ideas might already be obsolete. As such, Sci-Fi writers will either place their stories so far in the future that it doesn't matter if they're right (Ann Leckie, John Scalzi et. al.) or else remove all pretense of being realistic (China Mieville, steampunk etc.)

Viewed in that context, OSC's fearless attempt to write about world politics a few hundred years in the future suddenly appears very ambitious indeed. He has obviously taken some flak for this, as it is almost impossible to write about wars and diplomacy between different countries without somebody being offended, but personally I believe he deserves praise. He's pushing the boundaries of the genre forward by going where few writers dared to. Even more importantly, although admittedly not obvious from the novel itself, he made a concerted effort to not just make up some B.S. but to present a feasible picture of what the world might look like in the future, based on extensive research.

Not that I think he did a particularly good job of that. His understanding of the forces that drive history seem a bit naive and the idea of children leading entire nations - even genius children - is a bit of a hard sell that you just have to swallow to enjoy the book. Naturally, he will certainly be wrong in almost all of his predictions, but at least he's trying, and that's more than can be said of most.

My son was eager for me to read the 2nd book in this series because he thought I would really like it. I will say that is more my style than the rest of the Ender’s Game series. I’ll probably continue to read the series on a slow monthly basis.

This actually deserves a 3.5 rather than a 4. Hello Goodreads! Give me half stars!

I'm tearing through this series at a rate of about one a day, which must mean something. I'm following the two storylines in parallel chronology (ish, as they move at different rates of speed), by which I mean that I've read Ender 1, Bean 1, Ender 2, and now Bean 2.

I like the Bean storyline because it deals with things that seem very real: the problems left behind on Earth after the globalizing external foe has been defeated. The politics are interesting, and I've enjoyed Card's handiwork in taking the far-seeing concept he used in the mid-80s (communication via "the nets") and carefully sculpting it into the real internet in these books, written in the 2000s. Bean is an interesting character to follow in his development, becoming almost likable in this book.

In SotH, Card gives us not one but three strong female characters. His lack of interest in female characters in Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow bugged me, but I knew that it wasn't a matter of discrimination - they just didn't fit in the Battle School world. (Although why NOT...?) Here, Petra gets her turn as an (admittedly largely passive) hero, as does another female Battle School graduate - and the meddling nun, Sister Carlotta, plays a central role in both the action and the emotional landscape. Strike that - there were FOUR strong women in this book. Mrs. Wiggin pleasantly surprised me here, although I found that Peter's character in this book was unconvincing as a future leader of the world.

Ender's Game, and to a lesser extent Ender's Shadow, was a blockbuster space opera movie. Speaker for the Dead was more like Medicine Man: quieter, contemplative, nature-y, with sparks of plot-driving action and intrigue to give Sean Connery a chance to act dramatic. (Although Ender isn't Connery at all. I actually keep picturing Card himself when I try to imagine an adult Ender; I wonder how much that corresponds to his relationship with his creation.) Shadow of the Hegemon is neither of those things; it's never going to win an Oscar. It's more of a Nicolas Cage political action-thriller with zooming helicopters and tense phone calls and ridiculous feats of computing derring-do. It's a James Bond movie with cartoonishly wicked bad guys and the femme fatales who betray them through seduction.

Is it as good as the books that came before it? Not at all. Is it entertaining? Definitely.

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5.0 stars. Sometimes love is not a strong enough word so I am going to borrow from Woody Allen, "I LURVE THIS BOOK!!! This is my second favorite book in both Ender series (behind only Speaker for the Dead). In fact, like Speaker for the Dead, I thought this book significantly surpassed its predecessor, Ender's Shadow which I loved by the way.
 
This story takes place in the latter half of the 22nd century (so my poster above is for the 2208 elections), soon after the end of the Formic (aka Bugger) War when all of the gifted children of the Battle School that fought under Ender have returned to Earth. Upon their return, these gifted warriors all become instant national treasures in the eyes of their respective countries who want to use their vast expertise in strategy and tactics to assist them in the global war that they know is coming. It seems once the threat to humanity has been eliminated, people are going back to thinking of their own petty dreams of power...typical.

Ender, whose very presence on Earth was seen as too much of a destabilizing force, has agreed to be sent into exile to avoid a global fight over the use of his abilities. Personally, I think he should have shown up with his mates and kicked the idiots in power in their collective, narrow-minded asses, but that's just me.

Anyway, soon after their return, the former members of Ender's Army or “jeesh” are kidnapped and an attempt is made upon Bean's life. I won't give away any spoilers, but from this point forward the plot unfolds as a massive, complicated version of the board game "Risk" with moves, countermoves, alliances, betrayals and some absolutely stunning battle maneuvers with the end prize for all of this being global domination.

The scope of this book is amazing, but the best part about it is Card's writing and his attention to detail. Especially impressive is the dialogue between the various gifted characters (most notably Bean and Peter Wiggins) and how authentic it sounds. This certainly belongs among the elite installments of the Ender series and I give it my HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATION!!!

Nominee: Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel.

I have to say picking this book up was hoping for something like the original Enders Shadow. The action in that book is what pushed me to pick up this one. Much like speaker for the dead after Enders Game i was very disappointed at how the story just went a little flat. The first book in both of these series are fantastic and should be read more times than I ever could. The next book however, it seems Orson Scott Card just can't get another book to be as exiting as Battle School seems to be. Which is to be expected the other books are taking place during a war! But the next book goes into politics of the world, not the most interesting especially if you dive on to he other like I did. I would recommend reading these books if you were unsatisfied with the endings of the previous books but I often wish that I had stayed with the ending of Enders Shadow as the book wraps up very nicely. A good book but a little slow compared to the first book.

Very different from Ender’s Shadow. A lot more political, less action, more about the strategies of the war & how
wars start rather than war itself. I still enjoyed it, just a slower pace.

I enjoyed this book and finding out about events on earth after the war with the buggers.

I expected things to be farther along at the end based on the title however.

So far I'm enjoying the shadow series a lot more than ender series apart from ender's game. These books have felt more in the style of the first.

4-4.5 stars. I really enjoyed the military politics and finding out how everyone gets the jobs/ranks/titles that I knew from Ender in Exile that they get. I just wish I could have gotten more insight into Peter's motivations, it was the main reason I was so excited for this one.