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 Ender's Game: An Interesting Book 
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I wasn't sure if I would like this book just to the fact that it is science fiction and would not be my first selection in reading material. Once I started the book, I found it very interesting (more than The Big Test). I had to agree with some of the other comments that I have read so far; the children were thrust into being and thinking as adults without much thought to the fact that they are still children. I found myself many times going back to the author's comments in the introduction about how he "wanted to write a book in which gifted children are trained to fight in adult wars" (p. xx). Even though this was fiction, it seemed to be so ironic because in The Big Test, we took our "most gifted" out of war (battle) situations. This was a very interesting book.

Kim


Mon Feb 10, 2003 1:50 pm
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Good point Kim! I never understood why our country would not want to enlist the brightest kids to be the leaders in war. Didn't George Washington lead us in war and in peace?


Mon Feb 10, 2003 3:16 pm
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I too am enjoying this book. It reads fast and keeps my interest. I too am not a huge science fiction fan but I tolerate it because my husband is. He enjoys watching Star Trek at night sometimes and, well, if I am in the room with him I watch as well. I guess because of this I don't see these children as "normal" children. I see them as futuristic kids who have been "chosen" for the purpose of training in combat and keeping their race alive. Watching Star Trek has actually given me a background knowledge for this book. Though they are not the same they have similarities in that the children are often taken young to start learning a job aboard the ship, etc.


Mon Feb 10, 2003 3:16 pm
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:D I'm glad you guys enjoyed the book. It totally took me by surprise because I am not a sci-fi buff either.

Ok - What about Valentine? Do you think she's really as good a person as Ender believes or do you think she is, in her own way, as bad as Peter? I know she seems all right in the end, but I'll have to read the sequel before I pass final judgement.


Mon Feb 10, 2003 3:38 pm
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Regina, I think I want to believe that Valentine is as good as Ender thinks she is! I am like you, however, and want to see what happens in the sequel. You get a sense from how she really got into being Demostheses and her going along with Peter that she could like having power and that maybe she wasn't as "good" deep down.

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Mon Feb 10, 2003 4:46 pm
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I think her goodness is very much surface. I don't think she could think like Demostheses if she was as good as we are supposed to believe she is.

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Tue Feb 11, 2003 11:08 am
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Check this out - "And the character of Demosthenes gradually took on a life of its own. At times she found herself thinking like Demosthenes at the end of a writing session, agreeing with ideas that were supposed to be calculated poses." Card then writes "Perhaps it's impossible to wear an identity without becoming what you pretend to be." p. 231

Sci-fi or not, I think this guy is an excellent writer. I think Card is setting us up for a deeper, perhaps more sinister Val in later novels.


Tue Feb 11, 2003 12:55 pm
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Kim,
I too found the book to be interesting. On page XX in the introduction, Card does elude to the fact that according to him,"Children are perpetual, self-renewing underclass, helpless to escape the decisions of adults until they become adults." In the book Ender certainly feels this as probably many children in our society do. Ender to me was put in extreme competition situations by adults. Children in our society feel the immense competition as well in school and in sports.


Tue Feb 11, 2003 9:45 pm
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