The One with Ender's Shadow

217. Title & Author: Ender’s Shadow by Orson Scott Card (469 pages)

Genre: Fiction—Science Fiction

Completed: 21 February 2012

Summary & Review:

In order to survive on the streets of Rotterdam, Bean, who is incredibly undersized even for his young four years of age, uses his prodigious genius to become part of a local crew of street kids. His civilizing influence and obvious intelligence are noticed by a nun at a local charity kitchen who works with the I.F. to look for new recruits to send to the elite Battle School, a training ground for the future commanders of wars against the alien invaders. Bean easily posts the highest test scores ever recorded at Battle School and is seen by many of the faculty as the potential replacement for Ender Wiggin, the one on whom humanity’s hopes for survival are pinned. Rather than becoming Ender’s replacement, Bean becomes his most reliable ally as the two young geniuses take on an almost insurmountable and unbearable task.

This book is a parallel novel to Ender’s Game (#186), so it follows the main plot line of that book but uses Bean as the protagonist, allowing the reader to experience a whole new view and perspective on the incredible events Bean and Ender endure. While Bean served a vital role in Ender’s Game, we never really got into his head or knew a whole lot about him. This book explores Bean’s troubled past as an orphan on the streets nearly starving to death and traces his path to Battle School. What I found most fascinating about this book was seeing the mind set of Bean and how devoted he was to Ender. Bean’s character is an unmitigated genius, academically smarter than Ender, yet he is able to recognize that Ender possesses natural leadership qualities that make him the commander who must lead humanity’s fight for survival.

As this book is a companion novel to Ender’s Game, Card glosses over some of the explanations in this book that he delved into more deeply in the first. Therefore, one should read Ender’s Game before reading Ender’s Shadow to really appreciate how well Shadow complements and fills out Game.

Rating: 8.0