Ender's Shadow by Orson Scott Card

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


For those of you who aren't into the sci-fi scene, Orson Scott Card is a giant amongst men. His body of work is expansive and his books have crossed into movies and comics. Some of you are probably familiar with the sci-fi movie that came out a little while ago called Enders Game, based on Cards book. As far as adaptations go, not too bad, check it out if you get a chance. If you've read, or watched Enders Game then you probably recall a character named Bean in the story. By all accounts, Bean is a minimal character in Enders Game. In Enders Shadow, a parallel novel, we get to see how important Bean really is. The book starts off with a look at the recruiting program for gifted children that are selected for battle school. Here, we meet Bean as a toddler, living in the streets. He is insanely brilliant for a two year old to be able to survive the mean streets and without getting too spoilery we follow his rise from being a vagabond to a student in the battle school space station. Here is where the novel really picks up. While at the space station we see everything that was happening outside of Enders narrow view. We find out how much Bean helps Ender, and we also see the extent of Beans genius. For a fan of Card, this book is a fantastic in-depth look at life in the battle school, and for fans of sci-fi its just a great read all around. I don't really have much negative to say about the book except I wish in the beginning we could get to the battle school a little faster. I understand the need to develop the character but it just seemed a little drawn out. Besides that, it was good fun. Bean is a twisted genius and I would go to war to kill Buggers with him any day.

Orson Scott Card



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