That one was volume one of a (very repetitive) five-volume sci-fi retelling of the Book of Mormon, so presumably the story had certain constraints.
I never understood why he couldn’t just write the names the way he wanted them pronounced.
Not only that, but the kids both took positions that were opposite of their own beliefs and personalities.
:rolleyes:
It makes more sense when you know the major characters and plot points are based on The Book of Mormon (then it becomes a fascinating personality study on those characters). And the language patterns are based partially on Russian (hence the “Ny” sound).
Ender’s Game really is best read in adolescence, when you’re less likely to see the end coming and the whole “loner stuck in strange land” is maybe easier to identify with. Thematically it’s pretty solid. You can really tell the difference in his writing in the intervening years when you read Ender’s Shadow.
I read this for the first time a couple of years ago and hated it with an intense passion. I think that if I had read it before becoming a mother I wouldn’t have hated it so much. As it is, all I could think all the way through is that all the adults should have been lined up against a wall and shot. It was a long and disturbingly graphic story of child abuse, and I couldn’t see past that to anything else*.
I can see, vaguely, that if I had read it at 14 or so, it would have been a very different experience.
*Sometime after that I ran across the “Ender is Hitler” theory, which may not be true, but is certainly interesting. For some reason this theory makes intuitive sense to me, and it actually explains the odd sibling subplot, but it is also well into nutbar conspiracy theory territory, so I only mention it in a footnote.
While it was a decent story, I thought that Ender was a poorly written character. He is not at all what you’d expect of even a stunningly inteligent six-year-old. Were he supposed to be ten or twelve, the character would have felt more authentic, but as it was he seemed almost as alien to the human state of childhood as the buggers; it’s possible that it was intentional, but it didn’t feel intentional.
The strange thing is that Card can write realistic child characters, as evidenced by Lost Boys.
That one (the first book of the Homecoming saga) a retelling of the first part of the Book of Mormon (and the last book is a retelling of the middle of the Book of Mormon), just like the Alvin Maker series is a retelling of Joseph Smith’s life.
Frankly, I found Alvin Maker to be a lot more interesting, but I still liked a lot of the Homecoming series, even though the names were indeed a huge annoyance. Especially since he often had to make them veeeeeeeeery similar to the names of the actual characters in the Book of Mormon. Nafai (modeled after the BoM’s Nephi) is the most obvious, but in the fifth book, we have Akma and his pals the four sons of King Motiak: Mon, Aron-ha, Ominer, and Khimin, modeled after the BoM’s Alma and his pals the four sons of King Mosiah: Ammon, Aaron, Omner, and Himni. Come on, dude!
Oh, and:
I believe the new laws of physics in Xenocide (with the aiùas and whatnot) are also sorta modeled after Mormon beliefs about “intelligence” being the foundation of everything.
Just finished Ender in Exile and found it quite satisfying. It’s set after “Ender’s Game,” but before “Speaker for the Dead.”
For my taste is was crisp, clear, and straightforward, with a couple of decent twists.
I feel ancient here, as I still have my August 1977 subscription issue of Analog with the original “Ender’s Game” novella in it. (The cover features Robert Asprin’s “Cold Cash War.”) I was 28 when I first read it, so hardly a teener, but I found it bracingly absorbing at the time and it remains a personal favorite. The stripped-down original is much better in a gritty, live-or-die fashion than the novel it became, IMHO. I think his latest is closer in spirit to the original, without a lot of the tangents Card later went on.
Of course, YMMexceedinglyV.
When I was reading LHoD’s post way up there, my cursor was over the “t” in “tweener,” thus obscuring it and characterizing the protagonists as “weeners.” Which is pretty much spot on, if you ask me.
Ender’s Game was OK. (It’s the only one I’ve read.) Entertaining enough, but I got tired of the weenie-ness of Ender and the obvious Mary Sue references.
I read Ender’s Game as a young adult and absolutely loved it. I read Speaker for the Dead right after, and I thought it was good, but not great. In fact, I was disappointed how diminished Ender’s role was. After reading the pair, I wouldn’t say you’d need to continue with the rest of the series.
I enjoy reading Card quite a bit, but mostly because his writing style really flows for me, and because coming from a Mormon background myself, I get his explorations more than non-Mormons.
That said, I still enjoy his earlier works more than his later ones. If I were recommending some of his writing, I’d suggest A Planet Called Treason, The Worthing Saga, Wyrms, and his short stories collected in Maps in a Mirror. These are definitely less-polished than his later work, but more interesting.
Okay, okay - durn kids, growin’ up too fast…and get off my lawn! 
I asked a similar question several years back, though my opinion of the book was and remains less favorable: Ender’s Game: Why? (SPOILERS GALORE)
WARNING! That thread itself contains spoilers for the other books, but here’s a link to my OP which only spoils Ender’s Game itself: Ender’s Game is a really, really bad book.
Many of the answers suggested that the book’s apparent flaws were addressed in the sequels. I haven’t gotten around to checking those claims yet. I think the works of George Lucas may have permanently soured me on following people’s advice to check out the sequels of works I didn’t like. I’m wasting enough of my short life as it is.
Also, I have since learned that Orson Scott Card is apparently a colossal dick; and after he came out in favor of overthrowing the federal government if it ever legalizes gay marriage, frankly the Hitlerian parallels make a lot more sense than they should.
I actually find this not only plausible but advantageous. Polemic is more convincing to a mass audience than nuanced, reasonable arguments. And it seems easier to write polemic from the point of view opposite to your own–call it dry satire–than having to overemphasize, perhaps willfully misconstrue, your own positions.
Yeah, he’s upset quite a few of his fans with his … peculiar … articles about the war in Iraq, President Bush, and gay rights. The popular webcomic Something Positive even had did a big storyline about a character who was greatly troubled because he loved the books of (a thinly disguised) Orson Scott Card while hating his politics and his views on gay rights and the like. I often wonder if it would have turned out differently if it had been written after Empire was published.