“Most of us read stories that we know are not "true" because we're hungry for another kind of truth: the mythic truth about human nature in general, the particular truth about those life-communities that define our own identity, and the most specific truth of all: our own self-story. Fiction, because it is not about someone who lived in the real world, always has the possibility of being about oneself."

I LOVE THIS BOOK. I read it as a teenager many years ago and recently re-read the prequel series. So naturally, it was time to begin the main series starring Ender. It's so good! The plot is perfectly paced, the dialog is phenomenal, and I was on the edge of my seat for most of the book.

Five stars.

This is by far my favorite Science Fiction novel. I love this book! One of my favorite parts was when Ender took out the bully. People today are like “But we’re supposed to talk through our problems”....honey, there are just things in your life you need to punch out. Sorry. And punch out to win all future battles. This scene spoke to me because when David defeated Goliath he didn’t just sink a stone in his head and call it a day-which would allow the giant back up. Nope. David went over and cut the suckers head off. These two scenes for me symbolize how we need to completely cut off our fears. We need to go to the root of our fears and kill it. If we don’t, it will keep coming back. I really loved this book. There were no boring chapters. Countless times I would come across sentences and I would stop and think about them. Read this book. Your life will be better for it!

I am disgusted.

I am so thoroughly disgusted with this book that I can’t even logically explain my utter revulsion. Ender’s Game reads like propaganda, and the characters in it are living it. It wasn’t until I saw the comparison to Adolf Hitler that I thought of Hitler Junge, but it makes sense. These kids are brainwashed into becoming soldiers, killers, and they’re never given a choice.

Except it’s much worse than that. Ender actually learns to doubt, to disobey, to choose, and he chooses wrong. He chooses mass murder. To add insult to injury, he writes a book about it and gives voice to the voiceless, to the dead. How is that different from any other conqueror rewriting the history to suit them?

If this were a normal review, I’d remark upon the failed, nonexistent characterisations, the lack of character growth or lessons learned, the lack of actual challenges overcome (how can he overcome anything when he never fails?), the lack of plot that isn’t told in short paragraphs as in passing. But this isn’t a normal review and I’m just going to link you to better articles about the story itself.

This has to be, hands down, one of the best science fiction books written. Ender's Game is set in a disarmingly straightfoward sci-fi setting: a near future earth threatened by a hostile alien species with superior technology that seems determined to destroy the human race. The story centers on a young boy who is drafted into an all-consuming military training program at the age of 6. The program he's inducted into seeks to forge a new generation of military commanders out of gifted children, and it's sole purpose is to break them at any cost, until they finally discover someone who can't be broken. What follows is an emotionally complex and at times painfully familiar story of children struggling to accept their inner demons. Ender in particular is cursed with a brutal combination of profound empathy for others, and an overwhelming survival instinct that drives him to win no matter what the cost. It is this combination of gifts that may make him the commander the fleet needs in it's war against the alien invaders, but only if Ender can find a way to survive the burden of understanding his enemy so thoroughly that he can no longer see them as "the other," but as a reflection of himself.
The story is fast-paced, and Card's signature style of simple, plain language and streamlined descriptiveness serves to bring the characters front and center at all times. This book is infused with a very real sense of psychological and spiritual dislocation, and treats it's young protagonists as fully realized, intelligent, 3 dimensional characters struggling with very adult questions. Card's other signature: creating drama through ethical dilemmas, is also a central element of the story, and he does a very good job of challenging the reader to find some semblance of moral high ground anywhere. The conflicts between characters are made all the more powerful by the almost total lack of mystery: motivations and intent are laid out very clearly in most cases, and it is the reader's ability to empathize with everyone's point of view that makes the story less about winning and loosing and more about living with the consequences of either.
This book is thought provoking, emotionally complex, and ethically challenging. It's a powerful examination of conflict and violence, military necessity, family roles, and the ways in which we use the idea of "the other" to justify all manner of savagery.

Me ha gustado más de lo que esperaba en un principio. De todos modos, empezar un libro sin ningún tipo de expectativa ayuda mucho a que te sorprenda y te agrade, y eso es lo que me ha ocurrido con esta novela.

La historia me ha enganchado y siempre tenía ganas de seguir leyendo, algo que no me ocurre últimamente. Ha sido atrapante todo el proceso de aprendizaje de Ender, pero lo que más me ha gustado es el transfondo moral y psicológico. En cuanto a los personajes poco se puede hablar ya que la historia gira en torno a Ender en todo momento y los personajes secundarios únicamente aportan más al personaje principal que a ellos mismos. Uno de los puntos a favor es que me ha sorprendido y el final me ha dejado con ganas de seguir leyendo el siguiente, al que espero echar el guante cuando tenga una oportunidad.

Not my cup of tea. Considering that the author probably intended the reader to sympathize with the main character, I disliked the main character way too much, right from the start. Also, many people will probably disagree with me but I think this book is rife with the author’s personal prejudices. Off handed comments about women and different nationalities just threw me for a loop, left me wondering why they were included when they offered absolutely nothing towards the story. Additionally, I disliked the dialogue, slang, and boring characterizations.

The Game Just Got Serious

The best books are those that make you think and wonder. Even when you finish them, you may not be certain of what they are entirely about. Science fiction often boldly takes us to places no one has gone before and Ender’s Game does just that. Although the main character is a child and most of the characters too are children, don’t make the mistake of believing it’s a YA novel. It isn’t.

The heart of the story is about a precocious genius and how that genius is harvested to save the world. It’s as much an ode to all the misfit genius kids out there who suffer so much from their age-group peers because they don’t fit in as it is a prescient vision of how since the book came out tech geniuses have radically altered our world. These genius kids are isolated from their siblings and from their classmates who can’t take the weirdness or are jealous of the success of such kids.

Here, though, the world is at risk from bug-eyed aliens and only a kid genius who can think faster and with more originality than anyone else can save the world. And that very isolation is cherished because there can be no assistance from anyone. There can be no salvation from anyone. Ender Wiggins has to figure out how to survive and win. And win he does in battle after battle like advancing to each new video game level and figuring out the new tricks.

Card masterfully creates a new war school for genius children - a veritable Hogwarts School in Space. He also anticipates the internet and the Information Age.

The Game theory here is so interesting. How do you anticipate and adjust to rule changes. How do you overcome the odds by doing the unexpected. And who’s running the show? Who’s pulling the strings? Who’s motivating us? And can we see the whole picture or are we just being manipulated?

4 Stars for Ender’s Game (audiobook) by Orson Scott Card read by Stefan Rudnicki and Harlan Ellison. I think this book would have worked better for me if I had read the words instead of listening to the audio. The descriptions of what the world was like and the different environments were lacking. At the end of this audiobook Orson Scott Card talks about the decision to write it this way. He wanted to leave it up to the reader’s imagination. He also mentioned that he had received criticism for a gory scene from a reader. Card had the reader look for the scene and it wasn’t there. It was in the imagination of the reader. I also wasn’t happy with the choice for the voice of Ender. The adult male voice made me forget several times that this was an eleven- or twelve-year-old boy. That said, this is a great story. This is a five star book and this is why I think the audiobook is maybe a four star.

I was savaged by a miniature poodle the other day--wait--no, someone protested my review of The Giver the other day. If you have any pent-up rage from that college lit teacher who forced you to think about books, be sure to stop by and spew some incoherent vitriol--my reviews are now a socially acceptable site of catharsis for the insecure.

In any case, one of them made the argument that children need new versions of great books that are stupider, because children are just stupid versions of normal people. Happily-enough, The Giver is a totally stupid version of A Clockwork Orange or whatever Dystopian book (actually, it's a rewrite of Ayn Rand's Anthem).

Coincidentally, in my review of Alice In Wonderland, I happen to put forth my own philosophy regarding children's books. In short: they should present a complex, strange, many-faceted, and never dumbed-down world, because presenting a simple, one-sided, dumbed-down world both insults and stultifies a child's mind.

However, if someone were to say that this book were a childrenized version of Starship Troopers, I wouldn't sic a poodle on them. Both present a human/bug war, deal with the issues of death, war, the military complex, human interaction, personal growth, and all that good stuff.

Also, both authors have their heads up their asses and there must be a pretty good echo in there since they keep yelling their hearts out about one personal opinion or another. However, Orson Scott Card doesn't get into his pointless author surrogate diatribes until the second book in this series, so we may enjoy the first one uninterrupted.

So it's a pretty good book for children, and like romeo and Juliet, it's easy to see the appeal: kid defeats bullies and plays videogames to save the world(in one of the sequels, they save the world by making angry comments on the internet--surprising that one isn't more popular here). But more than that, it's not a bad book in general, so I guess I don't have to bother defining it as dumbed-down, or 'for kids'. Then again, a lot of grown-ups seem like they need their books dumbed-down. Just look at The Da Vinci Code compared to The Satanic Verses, or Foucault's Pendulum; or all three compared to The Illuminatus Trilogy. I'm pretty sure when it comes to stupid versions of things, adults have the monopoly.

This is really a great read. Loved the story and the characters. But if you peel back all of that good stuff, I also found that the way the author endeared the reader to the main character, how that character won over the other kids was a brilliant study in leadership. How to earn respect. (Which, I think is missing more and more in our society today). That underlining leadership theme is really what carries the story. The recruitment, training and battles were just the way the author got that point across.
Highly recommend this book. (Not only for readers but for future leaders as well).
David Putnam Author of The Bruno Johnson series.

A chilling world and story.

3.75 stars rounded up! This is my first ever sci-fi book! I loved learning about the state of the world in Ender's game and how much of a GENIUS Ender is. The only thing I disliked is that I wasn't super into the war games/battle parts but other than that such a fun read outside my comfort zone