Ender's Game
A novel by Orson Scott Card

Ender's Game is one of those books that sits on the shelf of the library looking at you as you check out other books. You see it, but it looks kind of old, so you go for the newer, shinier books right next to it. And you know you should read it... people keep telling you to read it... but you just never get to it. Then, one day, you read a review for a sequel on a certain site (hmmm... which one could that be?), and finally that curiosity is piqued. So you pick it up, and as you had thought it would be, it's excellent. And you wonder why you waited so long to pick it up in the first place. Procrastination, man. Procrastination is bad.

So what is this fabled book? you might ask. Well, it is about this little boy named Ender Wiggin, a child genius who is taken from his home to be trained alongside others, to become a future military leader in the fight against an alien race. It follows his life and how the world screwed him up to make him the "best of the best." It also parallels the leaders who messed him up, and his siblings in their grab for world domination.

So I suppose the next question will be, "So why is it so good?" (God, how many questions are you going to ask me? Gab, gab, gab! Let me do the review already!) Well, there is the obvious straightforward style for one. Orson Scott Card has a Master's in Literature. Like all students, he understands why it's so annoying to have to worry about symbolism, foreshadowing, and layers upon layers of meaning that no one but English teachers ever get. So he made it without all that stuff. Yes, this novel has no symbolism. Do you know how happy I was to find a novel, much less a novel considered a modern classic, like that? I was so happy I almost... er, did something extremely joyful-looking. But then I sat down. The people on the bus were staring.

Secondly, it's the straightforwardness of the story that grabs at your heart and wrenches it to and fro. The story could be construed as an international policy of child abuse to save the world, and the children are so real and unreal that it's scary. I won't give away the end -- really, would I do that? -- but I think it was the ending, the misperceptions playing out to their almost inevitable conclusion, that made it really bittersweet. It made me sigh. And think. And sigh again. I was happy for Ender at the end, but sad at the things he went through. I also like how Card left the ending open for things to come.

The last reason to love this book is that Ender is all of us. He is a genius that is consistently reviled by his peers, pushed around and made into a puppet. I know that's how I felt for most of my childhood, and I know I'm not the only one. So, although this book has more than one theme, it is easy to see that Ender's Game acts a commentary of the way children and adults alike act within society, even today. This timelessness is also another characteristic of a classic.

So, in essence, stop procrastinating and read the book! (Uh, y'know. If you want.)

RE-READ FACTOR: I would say so. Initially, the story is disturbing, so it's not something that you'll necessarily want to re-read in the next five minutes, but it is definitely something to re-visit when you start to become thoughtful or speculative.

SEQUEL FACTOR: Well, there are sequels out: Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, Children of the Mind and Ender's Shadow (though that's more of a companion novel). They are, of course, next on my list. The book is also in talks right now to become a movie, and I await that also with bated breath (depending on the whole director thing).

STRONG CHICK FACTOR: Hmmm... well on the one hand yes and the other hand no. And since I only have so many hands, I would have to say: make up your own mind. There's Valentine, Ender's sister who is alternately strong and weak, and Petra who is a strong girl, the only girl in Battle School, but is picked on ruthlessly for it and becomes a quiet victim.

-- S. Paige

Ender's Game, published by Tor Books, is currently available in hardcover and paperback.

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