Ender's Game (Ender #1) ~ Paperback ~ Orson Scott Card

The beloved science fiction classic by best-selling author Orson Scott Card. Ender Wiggin is Battle School's latest recruit. His teachers reckon he could become a great leader: and they need one. A vast alien force is headed for Earth, it's mission – the annihiliation of all human life. He could be our only hope, but first he must survive a brutal training programme. Recruited for military training, Andrew “Ender” Wiggin's childhood ends the moment he enters his new home: Battle School. Awards Hugo Award Winner 1986, Best Novel Nebula Award Winner 1985, Best Novel Locus Award Winner 1986 Winner of the 2008 Margaret A. Edwards Award Praise for Orson Scott Card ‘One of the most important SF writers, judged by awards, sales or volume of discussion’ LOCUS ‘The Ender Saga stands out as one of the very few serious moral tales set among the stars … enthralling … an extraordinarily talented author’ THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SCIENCE FICTION ‘The emotional punch is still as powerful as ever. Excellent’ SFX ‘Every volume of the Ender saga…comprises some of the most hauntingly brilliant writing of the decade’ INTERZONE Review “Ender is special. He is a Third – a third child in a world where most families are only allowed two, a third child with a special purpose. The world is doomed unless a leader is found who can attack alien armies already on the move across space. Ender, like his brother Peter and sister Valentine, is some kind of genius. Aged only six he is sent to Battle School and begins intensive training. Continually striving against his classmates, obsessively trialling new strategies for the ‘games’ that make up so much of his education, he learns rapidly. While Ender is being trained for battle, politicians are predicting wars between terrestrial countries if the invaders are repulsed. Peter and Valentine launch an offensive of their own by contributing articles to leading magazines and websites under false names. Gradually their opinions are adopted by leading thinkers and Peter becomes as powerful as he had all along intended. Ender and Valentine, however, need to escape both his and their own success. This is an absorbing novel, particularly in the sections detailing Ender's single-minded quest for improvement. The contrast between the narrow focus on Ender's training and the wider issues brought to life by Peter and Valentine is highly successful, and the climax of the book combines both strands in a tour-de-force of writing. The characterization – except that of the three children – is sketchy in the extreme, and the plot as a whole relies on considerable suspension of disbelief, but somehow neither of these things matters in comparison with the gripping story of Ender's game.” (Kirkus UK) Author Biography Orson Scott Card is the multi-award winning and bestselling author of a number of ground-breaking adult SFF novels. With a raft of science fiction awards and a dedicated following, Orson Scott Card writes imaginative and compelling novels that also explore questions about morality and religion. His Ender series is the most popular; but he also offers a fresh take on the Bible in his Women of Genesis books and has authored other history-based fantasy series.