February 2008. I went from one used book store to the next and could not find a single, beat up copy of Ender’s Game.
A fellow student in one of my writing classes had recommended that I read it (three years prior) and now it was on my brain it and nowhere to be found. The fact that I could not find it used anywhere told me it was probably okay to buy brand new, so I did, and it wasn’t the first time.
I read it in February, then again in April, and I think in October and December too. I read Ender’s Game at least once a year. I found it in the regular sci-fi section, but the cool versions are always in the young adult section. [I’m not usually a fan of adults reading young adult books, but a good book is a good book no matter what the target demographic is.]
As a writer I always try to figure out what makes a book work. Why do people love certain worlds and not others? Orson Scott Card has accomplished two things with Ender’s Game. He does a really good job at keeping you riveted through Ender’s personal trials and dilemmas. And of course Ender himself is the big draw. His inner struggles, while trying to grow up under such and extreme and intense environment is done so well. It rings true. As if growing up wasn’t already hard enough, throw on top of that an impending intergalactic war. Geez, talk about raising the stakes. Even though it takes place of several years the pacing is just right.
Ender’s Game is the first of a series. The rest happen when Ender is an adult and I love adult Ender even more than young Ender. Speaker for the Dead and Xenocide are both really excellent. With each book Card wrestles with a different moral question which plays out in the most fascinating ways. Children of Mind you have to read just to see what happens to everyone, but all the really great stuff happens in the first two. There is a fifth book, Ender in Exile, but it was added much later and is really for filling in the gaps in Ender’s growing up.
I will be at the midnight showing of the movie. When I saw Inception and the sequence where they fight in the hallways as it was turning, I thought immediately of the battle room and hoped one day to see this book on the big screen. November 1st is a long ways away.
A fellow student in one of my writing classes had recommended that I read it (three years prior) and now it was on my brain it and nowhere to be found. The fact that I could not find it used anywhere told me it was probably okay to buy brand new, so I did, and it wasn’t the first time.
I read it in February, then again in April, and I think in October and December too. I read Ender’s Game at least once a year. I found it in the regular sci-fi section, but the cool versions are always in the young adult section. [I’m not usually a fan of adults reading young adult books, but a good book is a good book no matter what the target demographic is.]
As a writer I always try to figure out what makes a book work. Why do people love certain worlds and not others? Orson Scott Card has accomplished two things with Ender’s Game. He does a really good job at keeping you riveted through Ender’s personal trials and dilemmas. And of course Ender himself is the big draw. His inner struggles, while trying to grow up under such and extreme and intense environment is done so well. It rings true. As if growing up wasn’t already hard enough, throw on top of that an impending intergalactic war. Geez, talk about raising the stakes. Even though it takes place of several years the pacing is just right.
Ender’s Game is the first of a series. The rest happen when Ender is an adult and I love adult Ender even more than young Ender. Speaker for the Dead and Xenocide are both really excellent. With each book Card wrestles with a different moral question which plays out in the most fascinating ways. Children of Mind you have to read just to see what happens to everyone, but all the really great stuff happens in the first two. There is a fifth book, Ender in Exile, but it was added much later and is really for filling in the gaps in Ender’s growing up.
I will be at the midnight showing of the movie. When I saw Inception and the sequence where they fight in the hallways as it was turning, I thought immediately of the battle room and hoped one day to see this book on the big screen. November 1st is a long ways away.
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