Ender's Game

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card (1985)

Nebula Award Winner

Hugo Award Winner

This is a science fiction classic. The first time I read it I was a junior in college with a very busy schedule. A friend recommended the novel to me and I picked up a copy. I thought it would be a good book to read when I had some free time during the semester. I was wrong. Once I started reading it I could not put it down. I carried it to class and read it until the professor would begin to lecture.I stayed up late and got up early to read a few more chapters. I completed it in just a few days and I was looking around for a sequel. Luckily Speaker for the Dead and Xenocide were already in print at the time.

Card's story follows the military training of a boy genius who just may save the world from the threat of an alien invasion. Andrew Wiggin is the third child in his family in a world where you have to get permission from the government to have kids. Each of his near genius siblings was tested for entrance in to Battle School but they did not get in. Andrew was the last chance thus the nickname Ender.

Readers of the book get to follow Ender to Battle school and learn about the unique training these kids go through preparing to be the leaders of the Earth's military. The threat of invasion by a technologically superior alien race has brought the worlds governments together with a common goal creating an environment where the worlds best young minds can be found and brought together in order to save the human race. Ender's class at Battle School will most likely be the last. This class must yield a leader that can defeat the alien invasion force before they get to Earth if they fail there will not be time to train another group.

I have read this book multiple times and it has been entertaining every time. It is definitely a stand alone story but it leaves you wanting to know more about Ender and his classmates. Card hasn't let us down in that regard, he has written 8 stories in Ender's world for us to enjoy and he is currently working on a screenplay for Ender's Game. The following is a list of the books in the Ender Series.

If you haven't read Ender's Game yet come by Discovery Depot and pick up a copy. If you read science fiction you cannot miss this classic.

1. Ender's Game (1985) Hugo Award Winner, Nebula Award Winner
2. Speaker for the Dead (1986) Hugo Award Winner, Nebula Award Winner
3. Xenocide (1991)
4. Children of the Mind (1996)
5. Ender's Shadow (1999)
6. Shadow of the Hegemon (2001)
7. Shadow Puppets (2002)
8. Shadow of the Giant (2005)