Ender’s Game

by Orson Scott Card

I knew this book was pretty good because my husband couldn’t put it down while he was reading it and he’s usually able to avoid most distractions during the school year.

Well, yeah, it’s a page turner! Great concept, excellent execution, and never a dull moment. Even if you don’t like sci-fi, you might like this. (And if you liked Harry Potter, you’ll love it.) It’s a very human book. Little Ender (he is astonishingly young) is pushed to his limits by the grown ups running his world, and you feel pushed right along with him. Frank Herbert frustrated me in Dune, sometimes things were so obvious (or it was obvious what he should have done to make it a better book! sorry, but that’s how I felt…) and other times I felt like a chapter had dropped out and I’d missed something important (the movie’s that way too!). Isaac Asimov frustrated me in Foundation, introducing new characters every few chapters and then forgetting to ever mention them again. But this book really works, really pulls you in, makes you feel that you know Ender like he knows himself.

One more thing: I swear, the technology is prophetic. None of the laptops or video games or internet concepts, complete with blogs, feel hokey. It feels like something someone would have written about this year, rather than the 70’s and 80’s. Way cool.