Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card (novel #191)

And with that anger, he [Ender] decided he was strong enough to defeat them –
the teachers, his enemies.

 

Ender’s Game is a Sci-Fi fantasy set in Earth’s future. Ender is a child prodigy and at age six is in training, along with other gifted children, to assess their suitability to be Earth’s hero and the savior of the human race. 

 

Some decades earlier, Earth was attacked by a superior insect-like alien force, un-affectionately known as the Buggers. Humanity was on the verge of annihilation, when one pilot saved the world in a miraculous and bold maneuver.

 

The powers that be believe it is only a matter of time before a new and larger invasion force returns. They intend to pre-empt the attack, by bringing the fight to the Buggers. They also believe that children, with their aptitude for multi-tasking video games are humanity’s best hope. 

 

And in test after test, Ender rises to the top, as the best of the best. After he clears Battle School in record time, he is sent to Command School in deep space. Some of his fellow students are part of his command team. They practice and drill, and practice and drill against the computer simulation – the game – of Ender's Game.

 

But there is a dark and carefully guarded secret about the game, that neither Ender, his team, nor the reader can guess – until an amazing climax.

 

(I have to smugly boast that I caught on to the big reveal, a few paragraphs before Ender. It was staggering).

 

There is a slightly anti-climactic chapter, which is prologue to successive books in the Ender-Verse.

 

My rating 3 ½ out of 5 stars

 

This was a reread, but nearly as good the second time, and in some ways better when I knew the secret all along, though it lacked the same WOW! If you don’t like Sci-Fi, you might still like Ender’s Game. The human drama drives the plot more than the technology or aliens. I’ll read more in the Ender-Verse. Have you read Ender’s Game? What did you think.

My version: I have a leather bound Easton Press edition, signed by Orson Scott Card - a gift from my daughter.

 

Film rendition: The 2013 film with Asa Butterfield as Ender and Harrison Ford is decent, though it can hardly do it well in two hours. In the book, Ender’s training takes six years, but the child actors in the film don’t age, so it seems like all the training is done in a few months. But the biggest flaw in the film was the moment of the reveal about the game. They dumbed it down to make sure the audience got it, and it wasn’t as powerful.