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Another pompous review
Jun. 9th, 2004 09:41 amI just finished Speaker for the Dead yesterday, the second book I have read by Orson Scott Card. The first, naturally, was Ender's Game, which I liked very much. I like its sequel as well, not least of all because it was such a unique and fresh way of writing a sequel. *Spoilers if you haven't read it, but that hardly matters since no one's reading this journal*
Yes, quite a way of writing a sequel. Only two characters from the first novel appear in the second, not to mention that it takes place three thousand years later. Card managed to write a story that was at least as interesting, if not more so, than the first. Many of the same questions come up, about dealing with an alien culture, with our faults and wrongdoings and the motivaitons behind them, and with the the rippling effects that every action and choice will have. In addition, there's the added implications of the memory of the horrible Xenocide, the burden Ender bears with the peculiar double sides of him, murderer and Speaker for the Dead, the new, frightening race on Lusitania, the nature of a Catholic colony, and on and on. Here's a book that really makes you think. It doesn't just rehash the first book by any means; it stands well either on its own or next to Ender's Game. Altogether, I liked it very much, though I can't say it always made me happy to read about, for example, a man and woman who are madly in love and don't realize they're half-brother and sister, or two men dying with their organs being methodically removed them their bodies....but good literature should never make you feel completely comfortable. Of course I plan on reading the rest of the series, including the companion novel Ender's Shadow and its various sequels.
Probably my only complaint is that all of Card's characters have a tendency to suddenly spout off deep, eloquent philosophical statements, and I just can't imagine anyone talking that way - I, for one, can never get my thoughts out as lucidly as they appear in my mind, and it seems to me that his characters might do to talk just a bit more awkwardly. But that's just a quibble.
Yes, quite a way of writing a sequel. Only two characters from the first novel appear in the second, not to mention that it takes place three thousand years later. Card managed to write a story that was at least as interesting, if not more so, than the first. Many of the same questions come up, about dealing with an alien culture, with our faults and wrongdoings and the motivaitons behind them, and with the the rippling effects that every action and choice will have. In addition, there's the added implications of the memory of the horrible Xenocide, the burden Ender bears with the peculiar double sides of him, murderer and Speaker for the Dead, the new, frightening race on Lusitania, the nature of a Catholic colony, and on and on. Here's a book that really makes you think. It doesn't just rehash the first book by any means; it stands well either on its own or next to Ender's Game. Altogether, I liked it very much, though I can't say it always made me happy to read about, for example, a man and woman who are madly in love and don't realize they're half-brother and sister, or two men dying with their organs being methodically removed them their bodies....but good literature should never make you feel completely comfortable. Of course I plan on reading the rest of the series, including the companion novel Ender's Shadow and its various sequels.
Probably my only complaint is that all of Card's characters have a tendency to suddenly spout off deep, eloquent philosophical statements, and I just can't imagine anyone talking that way - I, for one, can never get my thoughts out as lucidly as they appear in my mind, and it seems to me that his characters might do to talk just a bit more awkwardly. But that's just a quibble.
