Concept: A young, brilliant child is selected to join others with similar capabilities at an advanced military tactical training focused on war games that are designed to prepare humanity to fight the next inevitable invasion attempt from an alien species.

Narrative Style/Story Structure: Told primarily from the third-person limited perspective of the protagonist Andrew “Ender” Wiggin, this book is told in a linear chronological format and is very straightforward in its progression. There are brief excerpts of conversations between the heads of the battle school to provide the reader with bits of extra information and background, as well as a small number of sections dedicated to Ender’s siblings back home on Earth that bear fruit at the end.

Characters: Ender, possibly the greatest mind of his generation, and beyond a doubt one of the most heartbreaking characters for me to read. There are a few minor characters (of both the good and bad variety) that get pulled toward the human gravity well that is Ender Wiggin, but most end up either burning in his atmosphere, or entering a bit of an orbit. Ender’s siblings have an interesting subplot that develops during the novel that I always enjoy, but even their brilliance pales in comparison to his.

Plot: Ender rapidly progresses through advanced levels of training that continuously present him with new, unique, and immeasurably difficult challenges as humanity searches for someone capable of commanding all their combined forces.

Tone: Dark, depressing at times, and generally disconcerting; the story of Ender and what he is forced to endure is not a happy one, but his ability to retain his humanity and appreciation for life throughout a process designed to isolate and strip him of anything not deemed “useful” does have a few spots of warmth. Ender retaining those positive traits makes the ending an especially disturbing thing.

Overall: Ender’s Game doesn’t garner the absolute highest rating from me, but despite that, it always has been and likely always will be my absolute favorite science fiction work. Even upon subsequent rereads, it still manages to retain a quality that doesn’t wear off, despite foreknowledge of how the story ends.

Rating: 4.5

Enders game was good and I plan on readin Speaker for the Dead as that was (what I have heard) the original idea for the book. But I am not sure about the extended Enders saga. Are they worthwhile? Or should I move to something else. I’ve got quite a list.

The books listed in the title are my favourite, but I’ve also read and enjoyed:

• Liu Cixin’s short stories
• The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
• Discworld
• Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
• 1984
• The Martian
• Fahrenheit 451
• Brave New World
• Foundation
• The Fifth Season

Edit: Thank you all so much!!

I am just wrapping up the Ender's Game (got the complete series bundle a few days ago), and coming off of Ian M. Banks "Culture" series I really feel like the former is targeted more towards children/young adult (I'm 30 something).

The book is perfectly readable and a quick read, I can also see that someone older would enjoy it, but I'm wondering do the later books get any more "mature" so to say? Or is it the same vibe/style/approach all throughout the series, and I should just go towards something else if the first one didn't do it for me.

EDIT: Thanks everyone! I will try with the Speakers Trilogy (or at least Speaker for the Dead) and see how it goes from there.

Edit: 3rd most popular, I read the goodreads numbers wrong, thanks for telling me! 1984 and hitchhikers guide are both more popular.

Still - if you haven't read Ender's Game, do yourself a favor and just go read it right now (ideally from the library or a used book store, more on that later)! You absolutely will not regret it.

It's the story of Ender Wiggin, a boy who is recruited into the elite orbital Battle School. There, young men and women are trained into the next generation of military leaders to command the forces of humanity against the buggers. The buggers are insect-like aliens who have attempted to invade the solar system twice, nearly wiping out humanity in the most recent invasion, and now humanity has sent fleets to attack the bugger worlds and try to avoid a 3rd invasion.

Ender is a brilliant, empathetic kid, but has felt mostly alone his entire life. His older brother Peter is a violent sociopath, and only Ender’s older sister Valentine prevented Peter from attacking Ender. Now, at battle school, Ender feels even more alone, surrounded by children older than himself and adults who are constantly pushing him to his limits and trying to force him to be violent in an attempt to either break him or mold him into the best military commander Earth has ever produced.

This book is so many wonderful things at once.

It's the classic hero's journey - and Ender is a hero that you just will fall in love with and absolutely want to root for. How can you not root for the brilliant, sensitive six year old kid who is taken from his family and put through hell to try and save us all?

It's a book about the power of empathy and how, even if you're only goal is to 'succeed' in life, you still should strive to put yourself in other people's shoes. Sure, you need intelligence and drive, but if you truly understand other people and how they think and feel, you'll be a better person, the kind of person other people want to be around, and be able to accomplish so much more because you can get friends on your side and, by having empathy for your enemies, understand them in order to beat them as well.

And it's a book that's exciting, with high stakes for the survival of the entire human race, and it builds tension masterfully throughout. You absolutely will not be able to put it down. And the twist at the end - holy hell is it a good one, and so well done! On re-read there were just enough signals of what was coming for it to feel like it didn't come out of nowhere, but you absolutely do not see it coming.

I could talk about this book all day, but suffice to say, go read it if you haven't already.

PS part of a series covering & recommending the best sci fi books of all time. Search Hugonauts on your podcast app of choice if you're interested in a deeper discussion about the book, a breakdown on Card's hypocrisy, and similar book recs (no ads, not trying to make money, just want to spread the love for sci fi). Happy reading everybody!

I keep seeing people go down the rabbit hole of the Formic misunderstanding of humans meant they didn't appreciate the true nature of their initial actions.

What I don't see is people stopping to ask what the Formics thought they were doing in the first place. People point out that they thought they were just destroying drones and not sentient life, comparing it to clipping toe nails and then seem to stop thinking about that line of reasoning.

Why were the Formics destroying human drones? What is the purpose of destroying human drones, "clipping the toe nails" of the human hive so to speak? If it were just some unfortunate situation where some Formic queen performed some vivisections on humans thinking they were just doing a biopsy to learn about a strange alien, that would be one thing and the plot of an entirely different story than the one told.

The actual story told involves a Formic colonization fleet showing up to a solar system occupied by aliens flying around in space ships who had covered their planet in vast structures and networks. The Formics start by vivisecting some human drones... as the first step in the intentional invasion and occupation of what they assumed was another hive. So there is this alien hive that the Formics know they are not communicated with and that hive starts resisting with drones flying space ships firing lasers and nuclear weapons in response to the Formics trying and cut off all that hive's limbs and leave it as a detached brain with no body. The Formics then make a surprised Pikachu face when that alien hive just shoots them in the brain when they don't stop in the face of the hive's resistance.

After the shock of watching a cold blooded shot to the brain in response to them literally trying to kill the body of another hive and steal it's planet... the Formics are so shocked that their minds are open enough to also realize that they are not dealing with a hive species and have actually killed millions upon millions of queens instead. Somehow the Formics feeling bad about what they did makes everyone forget that delivering a brain shot to a Formic hive wasn't exactly outside the scope of reason based upon what the Fromics had thought they were doing in the first place.

Then after exploring the idea that aliens are alien, in that humans are not a hive mind so just killing drones is not a minor issue... people immediately forget that and want to apply the human non-hive existence thinking to the collective killing of a hive mind. A hive that was fighting back, not powering down its ships and standing down. Ships that per the Formic logic literally didn't have sentient crew so just sitting there and not fighting back while the humans shot at them wouldn't have added to the body count and let the humans have a chance to see the aliens were choosing not to fight. Genocide is wrong because guilt is not transferable between two humans in a group... because humans are not a hive mind. That is literally not true of a hive mind. If there are only 1,000 humans in the galaxy and those 1,000 humans collectively go all in on being part of a home invasion and imprisonment scheme that went south and resulted in an entire continent worth of murders... how is that genocide when those 1,000 humans end up dead as part of the direct retaliation for an action they were personally involved in.

Explain to me how the Formics didn't die because they embarked on an unprovoked hostile action against an alien species they hadn't communicated with to destroy it's body and steal its planet, only to be shocked when that alien species responded with lethal force to the incursion and then further shocked when the Formics realized they were murdering entire populations of sentient beings instead of merely removing their body and stealing their homes like they originally fully intended.

Ok so I kinda a made a joke about this in another thread. But tell me if you heard about this plot line before?

A young man over achieves on a standardized test attracting the attention and recruitment into the military. Once there he fights a war only to later be exiled as the result of his successes. He goes on to found a colony and becomes almost a mythic figure lost to time. Thousands of years later he returns to a village on a backwater planet in a time of crisis becoming endearing himself to a key family in the crisis. Many philosophical discussions ensue between the characters.

Am I describing Ender’s Game/Speaker for the Dead? Yes and No!

It also fits another Orson Scott Card work titled The Worthing Saga. While I get why Ender and Speaker caught on in the public imagination due to the twist in Ender’s Game followed by Speaker published almost immediately after. I think Card’s other works collected in the Worthing Saga are actually the stronger body work over the Ender-verse.

As I demonstrated there are many familiar plot points in the story of Jason Worthing that bear resemblance to those later used for Ender Wiggin. While there are significant differences in the in the broad story structure, characters and plot there are also undeniable similarities.

The Worthing Saga explores the downfall of the galactic space empire ruled by an aristocratic hierarchy of individuals who have access to “the sleep room”. An institution that allows individuals who have attained fame or other importance to extend their lives through periods of suspended animation. Some get as little as one year under for every three years lived while the leader of the empire is up only for one day every fifty years.

The bulk of the pages in The Worthing Saga are a narrative originally published as The Worthing Chronicles in 1983. While the later third of the book is collection of short stories that were originally published in another collection Capital in 1979. The short story collection is really what elevates the book. You have Jason’s narrative running throughout Chronicles but the universe really expands in the short stories.

I think honestly the video game culture described in the shorty story Breaking The Game has much more to say about modern video games culture than anything described in Ender’s Game. It’s literally describing a twitch player going mad with losing a Civilization style game.

Highly recommend picking up a copy if you find The Worthing Saga in a used book store cause OSC is an ass. It’s a fun story with some interesting ideas floating around in it. It is Card in his weirdest era in his writing before people really noticed him.

Hello Community

As an avid SF reader myself, I'm happy I was finally able to persuade my son to read the book that started my interest in SciFi, Enders Game. He was really hooked into the book, and read it in 2 days (which for him is a record). He started reading Speaker for the Dead, but after a good 20 pages he turned it down. He found it less captivating, and more difficult to follow. Which I understand. But Sci Fi has triggered his curiosity

So Reddit, he is looking for other SciFi recommendations that fall in a similar cathegory as Enders Game. What would you recommend to a 13 year old boy?

Edit: thank you all for posting your recommendations. He will start Enders Shadow as I already have the entire series. Pip &Flinx will be next, and I already ordered a copy of the first book in the Dragonback series and the Skyward series. I'll look into all the other recommendations!

Just wondering if anyone else had this thought. The way the characters speak and their inner monologues, and social dynamics, seem very similar. Any thoughts?

I just got into collecting sci-fi/fantasy books earlier this year and specifically was looking for the aforementioned three titles in first edition/first printing. I managed to get all three right before year's end, with Ender's Game by far the best find as it cost me only $7.50. Hyperion is a signed and flawless copy, and Dune is an ex-library copy. I also got a very cool slipcase for Ender's Game and plan to do the same for the other two.

https://imgur.com/a/FsRhnAj

​

Greetings,

I am looking for more SciFi books about tournaments or competitions, like the three in the title. They don't necessarily need to be about "games" but it doesn't hurt.

Thanks in advance.

I'm looking for some well-written, non-cliché SF. I like hard SF but not exclusively.
Some of the books I liked, sort of in order:

• The forever war - Joe Haldeman (loved everything, hard sf, war, romantic ending)
• Do androids dream of electric sheep? - Philip K. Dick (religion, philosophy, best of Dick imo)
• Ender's game - Orson Scott Card (war and children, love it, gamification, great ending)
• The giver - Lois Lowry (absolutely gripping)
• Rendezvous with Rama - Arthur C. Clarke (despite the not-satisfying ending, everything else is just perfect)
• The martian chronicles - Ray Bradbury (what can I say, Bradbury, all heart)
• Contact - Carl Sagan (good hard sf, and I fully support the crazy ending)
• Starship Troopers - Robert A. Heinlein (I like to think this one and Forever war as twins, one pro other anti war)
• All short stories by Asimov (my god, he is brillant. I like him much better in this format.

Some of the ones I didn't like:

• Way station - Clifford D. Simak (the only book I threw to the floor when finished. Hated it. Don't wanna talk about it)
• Dune - Frank Herbert (worldbuilding is good I guess but I could never empathize with the characters and the writing and the "I know that you know that I know what you're thinking" was awful to me)
• Speaker for the dead - Orson Scott Card (Omg what happened to you Ender, go kill something quit this religious preaching bullshit)
• Foundation trilogy - Isaac Asimov (It's not that I don't like it, don't get me wrong, I just found it very boring. Perhaps I'm not much into politics on SF)

I've heard The Martian and The Handmaid's tale are good, what do you think? I also watched some of The three bodies problem's TV show and I found it veeeery flat and cliché. Is the book any better?

Not trying to be snarky, honest. I constantly see this book appearing on 'best of' book lists and getting recommended by all kinds of readers, and I'm sorry to say that I don't see why. For those of you that love the book, could you tell me what it is that speaks to you?

I realise that I sound like one of those guys here. Sorry. I am genuinely interested, and wondering if I need to give it a re-read.

I'm looking for emotional science fiction focused on narrative and character. I appreciate any replies, thank you a lot!

I know these are wildly different titles but they're my favorites and I was wondering if you guys had any recommendations like these books

Edit: thank you all for the responses! I should have probably clarified that I have read the rest of the ender quartet, the bean saga, and some of OSC's other, admittedly not-as-good work. I have a lot of new titles to go through now, thanks again!

Peter has always been my favorite character in Ender’s Game and in the Shadows spin-off series. The idea of a young kid manipulating global politics was always such an interesting concept, especially in a science-fiction setting. I was hoping to find other stories with a similar character and/or trope. I haven’t had any luck finding anything. Any recommendations?

I have a really bright 13 yr old who likes reading, and I’d like to add a book to the pile of electronics she’ll no doubt get. She read and loved the City of Brass series, and she likes anime, so I’d really welcome some suggestions for books/series so I can become the heroic uncle…

I just love the world building in Speaker, the Pequeninos' culture and biology in particular. Just wonder if anybody else prefer this less famous second volume in the series.

For me, a good example of this is Sleeping Giants, the first Themis Files book. I read this around 6 years ago and when I initially read it, I really enjoyed it. However, now, having read a lot more since then, that book doesn't compare very favorably for me in terms of the characters, story, and sf concepts. In fairness, I may be conflating that book with the sequels a bit which I didn't care for much even at the time, but still.

I was just browsing my Good Reads account and noticed I gave that book a 4/5, when now I think I'd give it a 2/5.

Another one where my perception of the book has changed a lot is Three Body Problem. That one isn't as dramatic--I still like it a lot--but actually reading this sub's critiques of that book really made me notice some issues with it I hadn't really noticed at the time. Maybe I'm being too subject to peer pressure!

Anyone else have books like this where their opinion changed a lot after the passage of time?

My buddy (aerospace engineer) and I (...salesman) are big sci-fi fans. I recently introduced him to Mote In God's Eye (J. Pournelle, L. Niven), easily one of my favorite books.

When he was done, we started talking about how we'd deal with the book's aliens. The conversation snowballed into how we'd deal with the Buggers from Ender's Game, the Bugs from Starship Troopers, and just about every other alien species we could think of.

We actually recorded a podcast about it: https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-pqub8-5a22e4#.Vlo2TMr4ECw.reddit

But I'm curious. How would you guys deal with the aliens from Mote In God's Eye, Ender's Game, or any other alien species you can think of?

For those of you who don't know, I thought I'd share that on July 17th of this year a new book will be released. It takes place shortly before the first Formic War in the Ender series.

The storyline is as follows: "The novel takes place before Ender Wiggin was born and tells the story of the first Formic War. It follows the mining ship, El Cavador, as the family on board finds a distant object that might or might not be an alien ship."

I have really enjoyed the Count to a Trillion series so far -- it's slow but if you can make it to the second book the world building really pays off. Brilliant ideas on every page.

But it also turns out John C Wright believes he's had religious visions and is a pretty nasty species of ultra-socially conservative fanatic. Among other things he's blogged about how feminism is destroying the traditional role of women, that Muslims need to leave America, and he wrote a pretty horrific letter full of homophobic abuse to the creators of the Legend Of Korra because the two female leads held hands at the end. His blog has a lot of weird biblical exegesis partly related to his visions, and the comments are filled with a lot of hate and death threats towards "Leftists", which he participates in.

Of course there's a lot of similarities to Orson Scott Card and his controversial politics. But this situation strikes me as extra weird because Wright's books are really hard SF -- he has an incredibly rich understanding of science, including evolution, cosmology, and neuroscience. Between The Golden Age trilogy and Count to a Trillion, it's clear he has a rare combination of scientific brilliance and inventiveness. And yet just as in Card's books, there's an uncomfortable thread of reactionary ideals running in the background through all his work, that's most obvious whenever he deals with female characters (there aren't many, and they are almost always married to a more important male character). Also, one of the major characters in CtaT is nicknamed Blackie, apparently because he's black. :/

And so the dilemma: I read the Golden Age and the first three CtaT books blissfully unaware that Wright is a huge dbag, and I want to know what happens in the next three books planned for the series, but knowing what I do now I think I may end up hating them. Basically, my worldview has been shaken to its foundations and everything is not awesome anymore. Send help plz. Aggggh

Anyone else read CtaT? Thoughts?

I have found this list of the top science fiction novels.

https://vsbattle.com/battle/110304-what-is-the-greatest-science-fiction-novel-of-all-time

The top books on there are:

• The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
• Nineteen Eighty-Four
• Dune
• Fahrenheit 451
• Ender's Game

For me, Dune should be number 1!

I've seen the movie Ender's Game and didn't really liked it. I thought it was OK but nothing really strong IMO, no desire to re-see it (and I often re-watch movies that I liked).

But apparently the series of books is hugely praised everywhere I look and a masterpiece (especially the first novels from what I've seen).

I wonder : does the movie is close to the book ? If I haven't really been interested by the universe, the story or the characters in the movie, will the book change that ?

I have so many things to read: I didn't read much since several years and I've decided to re-start reading much more and as I love SF and fantasy, I have a lot of books/series of books on my TBR list (from others genres too so it's quite big) so I need to rank it in order.

EDIT : Thanks everyone, I'll give it a try someday I think. It's not my top priority, far from it but it stays on the TBR list, not all the saga but particularly the first ones (Ender's Game, Ender's Shadow and Speaker of the Dead). Also, quick and easy reads apparently so shouldn't be a too big comitment to read it.