Ender's Game BOOK REVIEW

Set in the future, Ender Wiggin is a sanctioned third child that the government hopes will be able to lead mankind in its third war against the Formatics. Years ago the Formatics, an alien race that looks and acts similar to many bug colonies, attacked Earth. Humanity barely survived the first two attacks, and if it wasn’t for a brilliant tactician during the second invasion Earth would have been destroyed. Now Earth is building a space fleet and taking the third fight to the Formatics home world, what they need is a commander.

The world has united under a temporary peace in order to put all efforts into defending the planet, and that includes monitoring all children from the moment they are born, looking for any potential commanders and leaders. At six years old, Ender and his family are visited by Graft, head of the International Fleet and the training at Battle School. While his older brother Peter was denied entry for being to maniacal and evil, and his sister was seen as too sweet, Ender was the perfect combination of the two and even though he is younger than most children entering Battle School, they want him now.

From the get go of Battle School the teachers try and set him up. Believing that Ender is the one to grow up and lead the Fleet against the Formatics, they want to keep him isolated so that he doesn’t rely on anyone, or become to engrossed with anyone or any group. Ender’s skill and talent outmatched anyone. He beat older kids in the game room while having no experience, he understood military tactics, and was made commander of his own “army” years before anyone else. He has never lost a game, no matter how the teachers have stacked the odds against him.

At nine years old, he is promoted out of Battle School, past pre-command, and straight into Command School. There he is isolated even more, the only contact he has at Command School is with his new mentor, Mazor Rachem, the one who held the Formatics back in the second attack, the man long believed to be dead. Together they train night and day, in both military, tactical, formatics movement, and leadership. Throughout this training, Ender keeps wondering if he’s the right one to be trained for this job, and how the other candidates in Command School are doing.

After months of one on one training, Ender moves onto the next stage, battle simulations. Ender commands a small group of his friends who have been brought up from Battle School. He as commander, and them as toon leaders they are put through hundreds of computer simulations of what they believe will happen when they get to the Formatics home planet. Sometimes they have multiple games a day, and the pressure to be perfect starts to get to them. Petra, the first person to show Ender kindness at Battle School faints and loses hundreds of star ships and causes them to lose a battle. All of them, including Ender are cracking under the pressure from studying, training, and the lack of sleep.

That is when Ender decides he has had enough and wants to drop out of Command School.  When Mazor Rackam tells Ender than the next simulation will be of the Formatics home planet and will be the final examination, Ender doesn’t even care. When the simulation starts, he just stands there, not giving a command. He doesn’t know how to attack the planet, and he doesn’t even care. To lighten the mood, he second in command and friend from Battle School Bean says, “The enemies gate is down.” A joke, and code from their days at school. That gives Ender an idea, making a wild move Ender is able to set off a chain reaction that blows up the planet and the bugger ships.

When the planet explodes Ender looks up to see Graft, the Hegemon of Earth, Mazor and many other grown and powerful men cheering and celebrating. As it turns out, Ender was never playing a simulation. He and his friends were in fact commanding the actual fleet. At this realization, Ender realizes that not only has he lead thousands of men to their deaths, but he is now responsible for the entire genocide of a species.

This isn’t even the end of the novel, and there is so much more to who Ender is and other things going on in the world. This is my all-time favorite book, and I reread it more than once a year. I recommend it to anyone and everyone.