Children of the Mind (The Ender saga) [Paperback]

Orson Scott Card's SF career began with Ender's Game, a 1977 story expanded into an acclaimed 1985 novel. Unwittingly responsible for xenocide--destruction of an alien species--while still a boy, Ender expiates his guilt on another world in Speaker for the Dead. This confronts humanity with a deadly alien-built virus whose elimination seems to demand another xenocide. The tense continuing story takes an extraordinary leap into magical metaphysics at the climax of Xenocide, of which Children of the Mind is in effect the second half. Though that virus is now defeated, this isn't believed: the planet-eating doomsday weapon still approaches. Ender's AI friend Jane, who inhabits the galactic net and is the only agency that can move spacecraft faster than light, is being killed by dismantling the net. Ender himself is fading, passing responsibility to strange young avatars of his dead brother and aging sister created from his memories in Xenocide. Even in the shadow of death there are grippingly argued political, philosophical and moral debates--plus bitter family quarrels. A master storyteller with a knack for showing painful human relationships, Card achieves almost unbearable suspense before resolving his complex tangle and finishing Ender's 3000-year story with a touching elegy. One dangling plot line suggests that Card may return again to this universe. Solid, high-quality SF despite some implausible science. --David Langford

'Haunting, compulsive, urgently readable...Story-telling genius' INTERZONE 'Card's prose is powerful' PUBLISHERS WEEKLY 'Full of surprises...Intense is the word for Orson Scott Card's ENDER'S GAME' NEW YORK TIMES

'Card's prose is powerful'

'Full of surprises...Intense is the word for Orson Scott Card's ENDER'S GAME'

The planet Lusitania is home to three sentient species: the Pequeninos; a large colony of humans; and the Hive Queen, brought there by Ender. But once again the human race has grown fearful; the Starways Congress has gathered a fleet to destroy Lusitania. Jane, the evolved computer intelligence, can save the three sentient races of Lusitania. She has learned how to move ships outside the universe, and then instantly back to a different world, abolishing the light-speed limit. But it takes all the processing power available to her, and the Starways Congress is shutting down the Net, world by world. Soon Jane will not be able to move the ships. Ender's children must save her if they are to save themselves.

CHILDREN OF THE MIND is the fourth book of Orson Scott Card's Ender saga - a series which has changed the face of science fiction.

Praise for Orson Scott Card

‘The Ender Saga stands out as one of the very few serious moral tales set among the stars … enthralling … an extraordinarily talented author’ THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SCIENCE FICTION

‘The emotional punch is still as powerful as ever. Excellent’ SFX

‘Almost impossible to put down’ LOCUS

By Orson Scott Card

Ender

Orson Scott Card is the award-winning author of the Ender saga, the Alvin Maker series and the Homecoming series. He lives with with wife and three children in the US.