Ender’s Game

A member of my book club picked “Ender’s Game” to discuss this week, which surprised some of us. Not many of us typically read science-fiction, and this novel came out in 1985; it was expanded from a 1977 short story. Was it really something we could get into?

Still I was curious. Apparently most guys I know seem to have read “Ender’s Game,” which won the Nebula and Hugo awards when it came out, and it is being released as a movie in 2013, with Harrison Ford, Abigail Breslin, Ben Kingsley and Viola Davis among others. It’s quite a cast. So I was willing to check out the book to see if it was more than just fodder for teenage boys.

The novel is set in the future after humans have fought two conflicts in space against an insect-like alien creature referred to as “buggers.” It’s about a young, gifted boy, Ender Wiggin, who is taken away from his family on Earth to train for the next war against the buggers at the exclusive Battle School, located in Earth’s orbit. He leaves behind a malevolent brother, Peter, and his beloved sister, Valentine, who he wont see for years.

At Battle School, Ender excels in military tactics amid the non-gravity atmosphere and leads his squad to victory in war games against the rest. He dominates the game but struggles with how his superiors manipulate his life and tip the playing field against him to groom him to be the ultimate leader. The pressures that he is the one to lead the forces to save Earth weigh on him, and he fears he’s like his brother, capable of hurting others.

After a grueling few years, he’s promoted to Command School, where a former war hero, Mazer Rackham, trains him using a war simulator. Soon Ender is commanding fleets on the simulator, practicing all-out war against the alien buggers. The simulations ramp up until his final test, which is like no other. What follows is an abrupt twist at the novel’s end that took me a bit by surprise.

Essentially, it’s a novel that involves becoming a leader, and what makes a good one. There’s a lot of war games and practice in it. I guess that’s why the U.S. Marine Corps has required the book in the past on its reading list. But it also raises ethical and moral questions about the military and waging war or obliteration.

“Ender’s Game” took me a while to get through, but I found it a surprisingly decent read, even though it’s not something I would normally pick up. It’s reading that’s a bit geared to young adult males, but it’s also semi-thought-provoking sci-fi, which is worth picking up every once in a blue while.