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Fiction. Science Fiction. HTML: In Lusitania, Ender found a world where humans and pequininos and the Hive Queen could all live together; where three very different intelligent species could find common ground at last. But Lusitania also harbors the descolada, a virus that kills all humans it infects, but which the pequininos require in order to become adults. The Startways Congress so fears the effects of the descolada, should it escape from Lusitania, that they have ordered the destruction of the entire planet, and all who live there. The Fleet is on its way and a second xenocide seems inevitable. Until the fleet vanishes. The task of discovering how the ships disappeared falls to Gloriously Bright, the most brilliant analytical mind in a world of people bred for superintelligence. There is little doubt that she can solve the puzzle; but will she choose life or death for the three races who live on Lusitania? Xenocide is the third novel in Orson Scott Card's The Ender Saga..… (more)
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1. There's a good novella buried in there, the "Gloriously Bright" sequence. Pity about the horrid Ender plot that surrounds it and that it gets tangled up with at the end.
2. The ending provides
The book begins when Valentine meets up with Miro in transit to Lusitania , and rapidly carries on from there until the landing 30 years after the original ending of Speaker for the Dead. Ender, Novinha and the children have been carrying on their lives dealing with the Descolada and the two other sentient species present on the planet.
At the same time we learn about a world that contains 'Godspoken' individuals called Path, which is based on Chinese culture. We learn of Han fei-tzu and his daughter Qing-Jao and their communion with the gods of their world.
Xenocide was full of the philosophical and quite frankly mind-bending issues that I have come to expect from him and definitely does not disappoint on that. From the issues of Jane's "creation", to the investigation of the connection between the Hive Queen and Ender, it fascinates and boggles the mind how Card continually produces this outstanding material.
The book is an enjoyable read through and through, it's slow and in places and fast paced in others, as has come to be expected. I think the main problem with the book was that not all that much actually happened, beneath the morality issues and the philosophical and indeed religious discussions. The book simply didn't have enough substance to it to qualify for a higher rating. That and the ending as I've already discussed quite infuriated me.
I am quite divided about this book.
On the one hand, the book is rich with original, thought-provoking ideas, like the two first in Ender's Quartet.
One of the ideas which most struck me was the moral question under which conditions it would be justified to annihilate another
I also very much appreciated the reflection on the question of free will applied to IA : Jane is doubting that she is alive, because she is just a (very sophisticated) computer program, unable to accomplish anything without cause. But cannot the same be said of human beings?
On the other hand, the plots contains imho some crucial deficiencies which make it hard to believe (and I do not even refer to the deus ex machina of faster-than-light-travel-through-wishful-thinking or all this pseudo-philosophical babble about philotes). Let me mention briefly the following questions :
- Going back to Speaker for the Dead, why did Jane cut the communications between Lusitania Fleet and Congress, if she knew - or couldn't possibly ignore - that this act would ultimately lead to her own destruction?
- Why doesn't Jane, this all-knowing, practically almighty IA, just hire a serial killer to get rid of Qing-jao? Why doesn't she take control of any computer-controlled device (cars, university equipment, whatever) to make her death pass as an accident? Why, at least, doesn't she alter slightly the message sent by Qing-jao to Congress, so that neither she nor Congress would ever detect the fraud?
- And why, more fundamentally, doesn't Jane just blow up this bloody Lusitania Fleet? Causing an accident by tampering in the computer of a few ships cruising near light speed should not be THAT difficult, nor forging a false report pretending there was an insurrection on board or whatever - did not Ockham's Razor law command to explore those possibilities, instead of concentrating so much energy on the unlikely attempt to discover a way to travel faster than light?
- Finally, knowing how dangerous the "new" Peter is, why doesn't Ender just get rid of him, instead of allowing him to wander freely in the universe and institute himself as a new Hegemon? For a man having committed xenocide twice (buggers & descolada), is the killing of only ONE pseudo-clone so difficult? And why doesn't Jane, arguably so wise and having had all the time the study the life of the real Peter, see the danger which represents his new avatar?
Fortunately, these inconsistencies did not prevent me from finishing and even enjoying this book, but make me seriously wonder whether I'll turn soon to the last part of the Quartet.
What I am trying to say is that Card used a lot of words to accomplish just very little in this book. Worth reading, though, just for the interesting ideas, and as a lead-in for the next and final book.
My main problem with this book was that it didn't 'live' for me the way Speaker for the Dead did. Card still crafts a good story but the jarring introduction of the world of Path to offer a counterpoint to the religious arguments and a resolution of some of the problems in the book didn't quite sit right for me. Nonetheless, I still whipped through this book and was engaged throughout with the characters and tale.
OSC does his usual excellent job of painting this world. Things do drag a bit when you're just wanting him to get on with it. If anything I feel there is too much characterisation and back story; or at least he is writing
Still a nice continuation of the series, I just believe that speaker, xenocide and children could have been condensed into a single book and would have benefitted from this.
The Congress calls upon its
Jane, the AI living within the ansible network, is discovered to be the culprit, and the daughter Han suggests shutting down the network, effectively killing her.
Meanwhile, the humans on Lusitania, as well as the Hive Queen, must find a way to survive the local virus that destroys all life other than the indigenous, and is responsible for enabling the indigenous life to continue.
The father Han, disappointed by the actions of his daughter, helps the Lusitanians develop a replacement virus. The only problem is that this virus, while a solution to the problem, is an impossible thing to make.
With the greatest stroke of luck, Jane discovers "the Outside", which is basically the chaos universe parallel to our ordered one, in which all live, theoretical or otherwise, exists, and in which spatial relativity is irrelevant. Merely envision it strongly enough, and it's yours.
Call it deus ex machine or thinking outside the box, the ending was what it was. Card is able to write a book that people will read. It may not be the best prose ever, but just the same, it's worth a read.
Though I enjoyed this book, as I have with the other Ender books, I must admit that it did drag at time. Some books do. But nevertheless, I read every page and was pleased with what I read. So much so that I acquired the next book in the series to be read at a future time.
If you're a really big fan of the Ender books, you'll probably like this. If you're an elitist who likes to complain, you'll also enjoy this book, as it will give you something to complain about.
If you liked the first 2 books in this series, you won't be disappointed by this one.