Ender in Exile
by Orson Scott Card
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Book Reviews of Ender in Exile
Book Review: Slow and wandering
Summary: 3 Stars
"Ender in Exile" is a "midquel", which is to say, it takes place near the end but before the conclusion of Ender's Game, where much of Card's Shadow series, which I haven't read in full, also takes place.
On the whole, the book seems a bit slow and wandering, and Card admits as much in his epilogue on how he wrote the book. He intended to fly through the beginning parts of the novel and concentrate on the confrontation of Ender and Achilles. As it stands, he concentrated on the former, and the latter -- where sits most of the tying up of loose ends from the other books -- seems like a hasty appendix.
I could have enjoyed the character-driven first part more if it hadn't been mismatched with a plot-driven appendix. On the other hand, the first part moved pretty slowly for me, and I often wished for more plot points to move it along.
In short, this will wrap up some loose ends for fans of the Ender and Shadow series (or spoil the latter if you haven't read those), but it's not on the same level as the first entry in either series.
Book Review: Not the best in the series
Summary: 3 Stars
Card himself notes that although the main story that emerges from the narrative is this two-year journey across to the new colony, the true purpose behind writing the book was to fill in many of the gaps from the other books in the series. Honestly, I found it a little boring, and although Card's ability to intricately weave a web of strategy and psychological battle, there's not enough going on in the meta-narrative to keep my interest. With many of the other books in this series, there are great wars being fought on the outside as well as the battles between characters on the inside. This one is largely lacking the great wars being fought on the outside to keep the tension high. The psychological interplay is interesting, but not enough to keep me turning from page to page as fast as possible.
Also, it's good that Card is filling in some of the gaps, and that will make this an interesting read for lovers of the Ender series and Ender universe, but on their own, the shorter stories aren't that engaging.
-Lindsey Miller, lindseyslibrary
Book Review: Hmm
Summary: 3 Stars
If you like the Ender Series, as I did, you'll probably want to read the book just to know more about what's happened to him.
I like the style of Card's writings. I turned the pages because I wanted to find out what happened next.
That said, the book is only worth a 3 because:
Card skirted around having to actually describe relations between Ender and other people by not having them communicate, or by email if they did. Very little dialogue is there. It seemed like a cop-out to me.
All the women in this book are dumb, evil, flaky, or dependent. Valentine follows Ender around and offers no real input. Men are responsible for discoveries or anything great.
I felt that there was an unintentional slight to a non-American culture. I'm not sure how much Card knows when he goes into talking about diverse people, but he never seems to do a nice job of it, to me.
Book Review: Eh...
Summary: 3 Stars
Because Ender's Game remains one of my favorite books of all time, I am the sucker that feels the need to keep reading these silly books from the mediocre Shadow Series to what I felt were the aweful short stand alone stories like First Meetings and that terrible gift giving story. So I read this with low expectations and was not totally annoyed with it so I gave it 4 stars. It is a fast read, was mildly entertaining, but it really doesn't add anything to the characters nor the overall story. I guess if you are like me and addicted to Ender's Game you will read anything that takes place in the Enderverse so why read the reviews? If you enjoyed Ender's Game but are not obsessed with it I would skip this book and certainly would not pay for it. If you want to know how Ender ends up read Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and Children of the Mind and leave it alone at that.Book Review: Another Quality Addition to Ender Series
Summary: 4 Stars
A new Ender book from Orson Scott Card? He just keeps them coming. I had no idea another one was even in the works until I started browsing recently, and lo and behold, it arrived as a present under the tree.
This Ender book takes place mostly between chapters 14 and 15 of "Ender's Game". It did puzzle me a few times to try to remember when things had occurred and whether this story line was the same as that story line or if this had been mentioned in a different book. The puzzling was an annoyance, but Card does include a chapter in the end explaining some of it.
The book itself is a joy to read. I had a little trouble getting into it, since I knew what was coming, but once it got to the point of the story, it was a great read. Great characters, decent plot and as always, well orchestrated. Highly recommended to all Ender fans.