Book Review: Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

Winner of the Hugo and Nebula Awards

In order to develop a secure defense against a hostile alien race's next attack, government agencies breed child geniuses and train them as soldiers. A brilliant young boy, Andrew "Ender" Wiggin lives with his kind but distant parents, his sadistic brother Peter, and the person he loves more than anyone else, his sister Valentine. Peter and Valentine were candidates for the soldier-training program but didn't make the cut--young Ender is the Wiggin drafted to the orbiting Battle School for rigorous military training.

Ender's skills make him a leader in school and respected in the Battle Room, where children play at mock battles in zero gravity. Yet growing up in an artificial community of young soldiers Ender suffers greatly from isolation, rivalry from his peers, pressure from the adult teachers, and an unsettling fear of the alien invaders. His psychological battles include loneliness, fear that he is becoming like the cruel brother he remembers, and fanning the flames of devotion to his beloved sister.

Is Ender the general Earth needs? But Ender is not the only result of the genetic experiments. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway for almost as long. Ender's two older siblings are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. Between the three of them lie the abilities to remake a world. If, that is, the world survives.

Ender's Game is a story of a six year old boy named Andrew Wiggins, or Ender as he is affectionately known. The youngest of three children, he is know as a Third, in a time when it was forbidden to have more than two children in a family.

He is taken from his family and sent into space to Battle School, to train to protect the earth from a deadly formic race know as the Buggers, which are bug-like creatures who tried to invaded the Earth and cause another world war. They didn’t win, but destroy a lot of people in the process. This is when the government came up with the idea of Battle School.

Ender is among other highly intelligent children from around the world, but he is the youngest ever picked. His older brother Peter and sister Valentine are just as smart but were not chosen. Peter is crazy or so everyone thinks, but I feel like he is misunderstood. He like to see pain and death, and because of this he was not accepted into Battle School. Valentine is too mild mannered, which is why she was not chosen. 

Ender has to grow up pretty fast in order to survive this new environment. These kids are super intelligent and some extremely aggressive, but Ender has a big heart and soon finds himself in the role of leader; to a bunch of kids who could use the extra help, when it comes to training. The Teachers see his potential for promotion and add even more pressure.

It is sad to read about the things Ender has to go through, but in the end, he still tried to make it better. His power of forgiveness of still trying to show the world that just because you don't understand something doesn't mean you have to kill it.

I found Ender's Game to be a most unusual book, mainly because it in not my usual area of reading. It is this unusualness that drew me it. The story has totally captured my mind. At first I thought it is going to be a hard luck story but it turns into this story about a boy (Andrew Wiggins A.K.A Ender) and his will to live and over come his fear.

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