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Speaker for the Dead (The Ender Quintet)

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After reading Ender's Game, and loving it more than I thoughtpossible, I read "Speaker for the Dead". In theintroduction, (if you ever bother to read those things), the authorpoints out that Speaker was his original idea. He wrote "Ender's Game" as BACKGROUND! "Game" won the Hugo and Nebula awards as a background novel. In this story we "meet" Ender again, this time as a rather jaded thirty-something man who has to keep his identity a secret. History has unfairly branded him a mass murderer rather than the hero as he was first regarded, or the abused child he was in reality. He is the original "Speaker for the Dead", a humanistic ideology/psuedo-religeon that teaches the virtues of the truth. Don't let this mumbo jumbo throw you, its a great read that doesn't get too mystical. The book would be great on its own, but it's all the greater because anyone who's read "Ender's game" already knows the protagonist in more depth than any character in recent memory from any book. Ender is our childhood friend, who we have the priviledge of meeting again in adulthood. The reader will root for the boy to become greater than the myth and end his life of lonliness. He is summoned to a colony world that has discovered another form of sentient life. Ender is there to speak a death, (give an honest to the point of being harsh eulogy), but finds himself once again wrapped up in the politics of humanity. Basically he has to save the Portuguese Catholic world of Lusitania from a variety of things that would destroy it. What turns out to be his hardest task though is helping a family in emotional distress.

If it sounds complicated, it isn't. Card has given us another moral human tale, told in great detail and depth, yet never boring. Although the events in this book are far less catostrophic than the events our "hero" went through in Ender's game, the emotional impact is still there. We see what became of the lonly mistreated little genius, and how his life turned out. In "Game" Ender was battling for his own personal sanity and survival, playing by the rules of his controllers. In "Speaker", Ender fights for others. He has more control over the circumstances and chooses to help people he barely knows, and the last survivor of the race he was accused of wiping out.

We get a philosophically different book than "Ender's game", but it still has the power to break your heart and lift your spirits. We get a whole new set of personal moral dillemas, and see the dark and light sides of relationships. This book may be different in tone and philosophy than the prequel, but the main player is still intact. If you've read "Ender's Game", this is a must read. If you haven't, don't read this book yet. You'll like it, but that prize winning background novel is still worth the effort before going on to "Speaker". These two are the best books I've read in years.

As he tells us in the introduction (which is, by the way, the best introduction I've ever read), this is the book Card intended to write when he began the ever-popular Ender series. Ender's Game was simply a prologue -- originally a short story.

There are so many good things about this book. Card has a talent for writing deep, real characters that I've never seen in sci-fi and seldom in any modern literature. He is a master storyteller, and this book is wonderfully paced -- you will continually be twisting your brain trying to uncover what is up with the pequeninos before the scientists do.

But most of all, this book is a eloquent manifesto of humanism. As Speaker for the Dead, it is our hero Ender's lifelong task to understand people and tell the truth about them -- a truth that will reveal their good, bad, and ugly, but most importantly, their inherent worth and um, goodness. This truth-seeking carries from the individual to the entire races, as Card (and Ender) examine how we relate to those we don't understand, even those we can't understand.

So what is it? It's a page-turner, crazy idea-filled(as all sci-fi should be) thrilling, thoughtful, powerful, funny, poignant novel. It is an excellent piece of writing that I would love to see taught in high school classrooms.

My only problems with it are that terrible cover(who designed these covers? They have nothing to do with the story -- not even the tone of the story) and the sometimes indecipherable use of portuguese. But those are both minor.

An excerpt:

"We know you now. That makes all the difference, doesn't it? Even Quim doesn't hate you now. When you really know somebody, you can't hate them." "Or maybe it's just that you can't really know them until you stop hating them." "Is that a circular paradox? Dom Cristao says that most truth can be only expressed in circular paradoxes." "I don't think it has anything to do with truth, Olhado. It's just cause and effect. We can never sort them out. Science refuses to admit any cause except first cause-- knock down one domino, the one next to it also falls. But when it comes to human beings, the only type of cause that matters is final cause, the purpose. What a person had in mind. Once you understand what people really want, you can't hate them anymore. You can fear them, but you can't hate them, because you can always find the same desires in your own heart."

If you'd like to discuss this novel, e-mail me at krischwe@whitman.edu

Unlike Enders War or Enders Shadow, this is not a combat adventure; it is about remorse and redemption. It is about respect for differences so different that you find them abhorent. It is about accepting things as they are and trying to make them better rather than giving up or feeling sorry for yourself. While the "Enders" books are ripe for teens, this book is for adults in that it is more thoughtful and more about preventing wrongful action as opposed to taking aggressive action.

Very different from its predecessor, this novel has very little warfare or space action. However, it is just as absorbing and suspenseful and probably the better of the two. A story about redemption, forgiveness and the power of love, this was a moving and well-written novel. This (with Ender's Game right behind) is one of the best sci-fi books I have ever read.

...but far from great. After having read Ender's Game and finding it thoroughly engrossing, I naturally proceeded to this sequel with high expectations. I was disappointed. Don't get me wrong--this is still good sf worth your time--but it just can't compare with the depth and excitement of Ender's Game.

Although I liked the book, I could really only give it two stars due to what I consider to be some rather glaring faults:

1) The book is overly preachy and sentimental. The entire plot centers around racial misunderstanding (even the little sub-plots), and the apparent goal of the book is to teach a lesson in social conduct. Frankly, I never much cared for books that depended on a goal or a moral to make sense. The story should stand on its own without being some sort of political forum or propaganda.

2) The time-line just doesn't make a lot of sense. Why is it that there seems to be virtually no technological advancement after 3000 years of continually expanding human society? In the next book you find out that faster-than-light-speed travel is possible, so why haven't humans developed it by then? And why, oh why, would they be using essentially the same computer network for an entire three millenia? Reached its peek? The world of Ender's Game seemed at least marginally plausible, but the world of SFTD just seems to be a construction built around Ender for the purposes of a somewhat shaky plot-line.

3) The plot pivots around one crucial revelation early in the book, which is kept a secret from the reader intentionally as a motivator. More specifically, one of the characters finds out an interesting bit of information and then promptly--conveniently--dies before he gets to tell anyone. Personally, I think this is a particularly cheap plot device that should be kept exclusive to the realm of pulp murder mysteries. It doesn't make you enjoy the book more, it just makes you want to skip to the end to find out what the answer is. To make matters worse, the author drops enough clues early on, that you can guess the answer long before its handed to you, making the rest of the book filler (sentimental and preachy filler, at that).

Even with these faults, I'd still say the book is worth a read, if only as a continuation of an otherwise brilliant series. If you haven't already, though, I'd suggest you start with the first, and best of the series--Ender's Game--before reading this one.

Dies ist der zweite Band des "Ender-Zyklus", zu dem gehören: 1. "Ender's Game"; 2. "Speaker of the Dead"; 3. "Xenocide". Der zweite und dritte Band gehören im Grunde genommen zusammen, weshalb ich empfehlen würde, sie beide auf einmal zu kaufen oder, wenn Sie den ersten Band auch noch nicht gekauft haben, den deutschen Sammelband zu kaufen, der alle drei Bände enthält. Der Zyklus eignet sich aber auch zum Einsteigen für im Englischen noch unerfahrene Leser.

Zur Handlung der beiden Bände: Ender bereut inzwischen, daß er aus Unwissenheit eine außerirdische Rasse vernichtet hat und wird deshalb zum "Sprecher für die Toten", d.h. er trägt die Erinnerung an die Toten weiter. Außerdem sucht er nach einem neuen Planeten, auf dem er die Königin der Insektenwesen ausschlüpfen lassen kann. Seine Reise führt ihn schließlich auf einen Planeten, auf dem eine weitere Rasse lebt, die noch seltsamer ist als die Insektenwesen. Während die Menschen dort versuchen, Verständnis für die fremden Rasse aufzubauen, wird sie auf anderen Planeten als Gefahr angesehen.

Die beiden Bände sind meiner Meinung nach aus zwei Gründen im Vergleich zu "Ender's Game" eine Enttäuschung: Erstens werden auch hier moralische Grundfragen angesprochen, aber es fehlt die Pointiertheit von "Ender's Game". Zweitens ist zwar die Handlung wesentlich komplexer als in "Ender's Game" - es gibt wesentlich mehr Handlungsstränge, mehr Geheimnisse und es werden mehr Fragen aufgeworfen -, aber auch am Ende des dritten Bandes bleiben die meisten Fragen offen, was extrem unbefriedigend ist. (Dies ist eine Amazon.de an der Uni-Studentenrezension.)

As a teacher, I have insisted that my high school freshmen all read Ender's Game. The fast pace and excellent character development engage the students and lead them toward discussion of serious issues, like how we treat those who are "different" and the ultimate goals and purposes of education. Speaker for the Dead has a different focus, and perhaps a different audience. Although many of my students have read it because they so loved Ender's Game, not many were ready for its sophistication.
Speaker for the Dead works for me in its treatment of two major issues. The first of these, expressed through the interaction (and its disastrous results) between the piggies and the humans, has to do with cultural relationships and the arrogant assumptions often made by the dominant culture. The humans function at a level of cultural blindness hard to understand through most of the novel, and that blindness has tragic consequences.
The second issue I love in this book is the concept of the Speaker for the Dead, the role that Ender Wiggin has taken on in his adulthood. A Speaker's job consists of traveling to places he is called to "speak" the life of someone who has died. These itinerant Speakers come to the person's life completely objectively, and thus they are able to speak the truth about that person--good and bad. The speaker helps the community deal with the person's death by allowing them to see that person completely; all the person's facets, foibles, and fortes are displayed. I found myself thinking that if mopre people read this book, we might have a whole new funereal ritual to deal with.
In short, while of a completely different tone than Ender's Game, Speaker for the Dead brings up some important issues, and it is well worth the time spent in reading it. Invest several days in this book; it deserves them.
--Prudence Plunkett (Prudence_Plunkett@breadnet.middlebury.edu)

immer noch aktuell, spannend, tiefsinnig, philosophisch, überraschend. einfach toll. Aber Enders-Game muss zuvor gelesen sein, sonst sind die Zusammenhänge nicht klar ersichtlich.

I really enjoyed Ender's Game, but Speaker for the Dead was even better.
While Ender's Game was written as background for Speaker for the Dead, I think that the books should be read in the order they were published which also makes it chronologically correct: First Ender's Game, then Speaker for the Dead (Ender in Exile is chronologically in between, but I haven't read it yet and it was published years later) In Ender's Game the story evolves around very intelligent children, which makes it interesting for both young and old. Speaker for the Dead seems more mature to me. (Be aware) I'm not sure if the book would be comprehendable and interesting enough for younger kids.

The books combine an interesting sci-fi story with intelligence and unusual characters. Personally I enjoy following Ender's thoughts the most. Card describes the characters' reasoning in great detail, which is the interesting part to me while not describing every detail of every landscape or room as so many other fantasy authors do. I really appreciate that since it keeps the story going forward all the time.
Even though I have to agree it is not an adventure story in the normal sense, I think in the way it discusses humanity, the impact of truth it never feels boring or too long. There is not a lot of fighting going on, rather an understanding and questions about the way humans treat other species. All in all it is a very intellectual book about how we should also treat each other in understanding our differences.
I'm currently reading the third book "Xenocide", and would already recommend reading the whole series.

Kurz und knapp: Ich lese gern anspruchsvollere SF (Asimov, Clarke, etc.) und bin eher zufällig über O.S. Card gestolpert. Gut zu lesen und insgesamt spannend und tolle Story!