Book Blog #65: Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

Title: Ender's Game
Author: Orson Scott Card
# of Pages: 324 (paperback)
Genres: YA, Science Fiction, Fantasy
Rating: ★★★☆☆
Synopsis: Once Again, Earth is under attack. An alien species is poised for a front assault. The survival of humanity depends on a military genius who can defeat the aliens. But who?

Ender Wiggin. Brilliant. Ruthless. Cunning. A tactical and strategic master. And a child.

Recruited for military training by the world government, Ender's childhood ends the moment he enters his new home: Battle School. Among the elite recruits Ender proves himself to be a genius among geniuses. In simulated war games he excels. But is the pressure and loneliness taking its toll on Ender? Simulations are one thing. How will Ender perform in real combat conditions? After all, Battle School is just a game. Right?

Review: Well, this book really threw me for a loop. I can't really say that I love, yet I can't say that I hate it because, honestly, both feelings towards this book were equal.

At first, I wasn't sure what to expect from this book. The movie is going to be coming out in November, and I thought that I ought to read the book before then. I was thinking that it was going to be of those books that require surface level thinking, which is probably why I hated the book. At first. The thought of a child being manipulated by almost everyone around him was absolutely horrifying while Ender's achievements were altogether unbelievable and unrealistic.

However, I began to realize that this wasn't your average young adult book. I had to stop taking everything that was said this book so literally and look at all of those crazy hidden messages. Once I was able to figure out what those were, I could appreciate Ender's Game a lot more, thus why I gave the book a decent rating.

So, as far as deeper meaning, a lot of it was explained at the end of the book for me. But when everything pieced together, I was amazed. For example, there was that fantasy game that Ender liked to play. He experienced those wolf children and had to kill them. The whole game seemed really bizarre to me at first, until after Ender came to the realization that the situation in the game was like what he had experienced when he was tricked into killing all of the buggers. He killed children in the game and in real life to reach "The End of the World".

If you are interested in watching the movie (or your reading the review after the movie already came out and you liked what you saw), then you should read it. But if you aren't into what I described above, then don't. Unless your someone like me, you're more than likely are going to either love it or hate it.