Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

Individual human beings are all tools, that the others use to help us all survive.

I finished Ender's Game on Friday evening - despite it being good and pretty exiting, it took better part of a month to finish it... I don't know what exactly I was expecting - generally I have an issue with much hyped books (or movies), especially when they are called classics. On the other hand, I do trust Henri's judgement, at least to a degree that I know I will like what he's recommending to me even if I don't agree with him in all regards.

But, Ender's Game. Yes, it's a good book - well written, good storyline. However, first of my issues is with the characters. Most of them are very young children, from six to twelve or so - yes, I know they are exceptional, but there's nothing childish about them. I find the concept of that young children doing and wanting to do things that they do a bit... well, unbelievable, be it killing or world domination. I know this can be argued within the context of the events in the book, but there is no other comparison of normal children (and being halfway in Speaker of the Dead it's starting to seem like all Card's child characters - and he likes to write about childeren - are like that: little adults).

But if we look past the unbelievable characters, there is the story between good and evil. But we are lead to believe that all is not what it seems. It looks like humans are the good guys and buggers are the bad guys - but at the same time we get heavy hints on the evil goverment sensoring things and hiding the truth. I'm sure this was ground breaking in the 70's when to book was written, but thirty years later it's kind of been done many times since then and doesn't come as such a surprise when it turns out that... well, I'm sure that if you belong in the minority that hasn't read this book you can pretty much take a guess anyway.

Maybe some people love this book because they can identify with Ender - for me there were no character like that in this book. (I think adult Valentine might have been, but we don't get to see that.) I liked Ender though - I liked the way he was potrayed: small and young but not weak in mind or morals, and his usage by the military made so much sense. I also like the Battle School - I especially liked the descriptions of Ender's battles and tactics, as I don't think that kind of understainding that Card had for 0 G battles with the problems and advantages comes naturally.

Long story short - in it's unbelievable characters and predictability, it was still a good book and I wouldn't hesitate recommending it to anyone. But as Orava said - Card's no Mievelle.