Neil Fein's Blog

First Meetings in Ender's Universe
Written by Orson Scott Card

Originally short story, then a trilogy of novels, the Ender series now spans seven novels. Whether this is warranted is left as an exercise for the reader, although with each novel that comes out, I take longer to get 'round to reading it. This small book of four short stories documenting the origins of characters in the Ender's Game series is much fresher than the recent novels that have been coming out.

Ender's father John Paul is introduced in The Polish Boy. In a Poland of the future, the country is a second-rate nation due to the noncompliant status of the country -- i.e., not accepting the birth control laws. John Paul comes across as a barely likable version of Peter. Card's speciality of writing fearfully intelligent young characters serves him well here.

John Paul returns in Teacher's Pest, not as powerful a tale as The Polish Boy but still very good. This story deals with John as an college student, and meeting his future wife Theresa Brown in the person of a teaching assistant. The academic, family, and governmental politics are well done, with shades of the later Shadow novels.

The original short story Ender's Game is included as well. The plot now seems quaint and contrived. It's no coincidence that the stories before it spend much time justifying the reasoning for bringing children into warfare.

The Investment Counselor introduces us to Jane, Ender's AI friend and Mr. Card's deus ex machina. Dealing with government corruption, the time spent on justifying Jane's origin makes this the weakest story in the book.

These are fun stories, and the book includes a readers' guide at the end. Recommended, but it's an expensive volume for only four stories. (Three of them have been published before; only half the book was new to me.)

Tags: books