Review - Ender's Game

I was warned Ender's Game would mess with my mind. Obviously, I didn't take these warnings to heart, since I got within the last thirty pages and started flailing with realisation. The end is a nice twist. If you go through the story complacently, if you identify with Ender and see things the way he does, it comes out of completely nowhere. But it also makes sense and works and is good, and I don't think I've read a better ending for a book in quite a while.

Ender, as a character, is pretty likeable despite his darker side. I loved the fact that his brother and sister had such an effect on him, and I loved that he and Valentine ended up in the same place again in the end. The last chapter feels quite rushed, but it does show us Ender growing up and changing, and presumably bridges to other books in the series. I don't know whether I want to read more right now, but I'll definitely pick the other books up if I see them on the shelves.

Other characters, such as Bean and Petra and Alai, were quite in the background, but I kind of wanted to know more about them, too.

One of my friends credits this book with changing his life. I wouldn't say it's been a life-changer for me, but it's very good sci-fi and very interesting and you could also have moral debates about a lot of it. Good book for discussion, I think.

Review - Old Man's War

If you live in the same city as me, be assured that the paper-and-ink copy of this book I read is going back to the library ASAP and you'll be able to borrow it after me. If not, I do have the PDF...

Old Man's War is sci-fi. Maybe not the most original sci-fi in the world -- I read it more or less alongside Ender's Game and noted some similarities -- but there are some more original things that raised my eyebrows and then got me interested. For instant, the biggest part: the main character enlists in the army on his seventy-fifth birthday.

Okay, then quite typically you get transference of consciousness between bodies, and specially modified soldiers, and Combat With Strange Alien Species, etc, etc. What makes Old Man's War fun, though, aside from that, is the humour. Sometimes it falls flat, but quite often I cackled appreciatively.

The ending is awesome. First I kind of wanted to punch John Scalzi, then I stopped, went oh, and sniffled just a little.

Definitely one I'd recommend. Easy reading, really, but that's not a bad thing. My main quibble is how dry the narrative is sometimes. That helps in some scenes, keeping it very cut down and straight to the point, but sometimes you want a bit more impact.