For everyone who is a loyal Ender fan, this novella will not disappoint! In this interesting story of faith, we get to journey back to Battle School again. While the story centers on a new character from Rat Army, Zeck, many of my favorite characters from the original series are present, including Ender and Dink. I loved getting another glimpse at Ender's journey and Dink's non-conformity.

But, what makes this story compelling is the moral debates at its center. Zeck refuses to fight in Battle Sc More...

I read this tiny book late Christmas night because Jeffrey asked me to. So far, in nearly twenty years, I've only disliked three books he's asked me to read. He has a pretty good track record, I'd say.

I think Orson Scott Card is one of the greatest living writers. It doesn't matter what he writes, it is powerful and the characters feel like living, breathing friends (or enemies). I am not a sci-fi fan. In fact, I never read it. About seven years ago Jeffrey asked me and asked me to read Ender's More...

What is it with Orson Scott Card's Ender books, particularly the Battle School ones? Card is always an insightful author, but nothing ever rings as true and as strong as when he takes his readers up to that same spot where his ride to fame took him three decades ago. A War of Gifts isn't even a novel. It's an extended short story, really. And it should be commercial drivel, since it was specifically made for the Christmas season. There are a lot of things it should have been, but instead it was More...

This novella is set while Ender is at Battle School in Rat Army. It is a story about how two Dutch students observing Sinterklaas Day sets off a war between the students and the faculty over religious observance.

I have found that the books in the Ender Series sort of fall all over the place in quality. Ender's Game and [boook:Ender's Shadow] are both really excellent books. Speaker for the Dead is alright, and I think that Xenocide and Children of the Mind fall off pretty fast quality wise. Like More...

I first read Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card when I was twelve or thirteen. It’s the story of a young kid who is taken to Battle School (where soldiers are prepared to lead fleets against an alien race) and his experience while he’s there. It’s one of the best books I’ve ever read. It has great characters, and the descriptions of fighting while in zero gravity are amazing. I read it every couple of years, and actually started reading it again after this week’s book.

Truly it’s difficult to creat More...

I received A War of Gifts in the mail a couple days ago, just in time for the Holidays, and finished it in under an hour last night. Though this book is sometimes called the tenth novel in the Ender universe (I’m looking at you, wikipedia), it’s best viewed as a short novella.

In 126 small, wide-margin pages, it tells the story of Zeck, an abused minister’s son, Dink, later one of the eleven children who command the counteroffensive against the aliens, and Flip, a Dutch boy who is homesick for so More...

Fans of the Ender Game’s series are not to be messed with. They know what they want – intelligent children, a potential brutal war, aspects of battle school, and drama among child soldiers.
Orson Scott Card doesn’t exactly fulfill all of these things fans of the Ender Game’s series have come accustom to loving. In A War of Gifts, the story opens with a main character in this story, Zeck Morgan, in his father’s church listening to his sermon. From here he gets forced into battle school where he More...

I tried, Orson Scott Card, I really did.

Ender's Game is a brilliant novel. Ender's Shadow is not quite as good, but very much worth the read. After those, I read the rest of the 4-book Shadow Saga started in Ender's Shadow. They each got progressively worse.

I haven't read Speaker for the Dead or Xenocide, but I may or may not give those a try. TBD.

Here's the problem: none of these characters sound like real people. They might, if they were all supposed the be 35-year old MENSA members.

But they' More...

When have holiday-themed sci fi books/movies ever worked out well for science fiction? In a weird, "A Star Wars Christmas Special" way, A War of Gifts presents an abused, Fundamentalist little boy who refuses to fight in Battle School (so why did he go in the first place?) and whose heart eventually grows three sizes that day after meeting Ender-Loo-Who. If anyone can heal little Zech's heart, it's child prodigy Ender Wiggin.

I've come down pretty hard on the Ender books in my reviews. It's becau More...

To put it simply, this is an awesome book, as usual, from Orson Scott Card. The novel is short and sweet, a mere 120 pages (small pages too), it took me less than an hour to read. In retrospect, perhaps it could be automatically awesome to me because it takes place in Ender's Universe... but oh well, I love it anyway! ;)

In case you have no idea what I'm talking about, this book is an accompaniment to Ender's Game. So it is odd that goodreads refers to it as a "saga" because (like Ender's Shado

More...

I grabbed this book at the airport looking for something to read on a two hour flight, and it was perfect!

First, let me warn you; if you haven't read Ender's Game, you won't like this book because you won't know the characters. This is a short book and only takes time to get to know the new character, Zeck. It's assumed that you already know characters like Ender and Dink.

It's a good, fast story with some moral conflict and even a little heart wrenching. Zeck is a child chosen to go to the spac More...

Yay for another Christmas story! Except that this is a small novella that takes place during the events of Ender’s Game (which is awesome), and of course it’s not exactly a warm-and-fuzzy Christmas story.

So the story mainly revolves around Zeck (who I don’t remember being in Ender’s Game, but my memory definitely could be failing me there). Zeck is a 6-year old boy, and the son of a fierce Christian preacher - more of a religious zealot than anything. Zeck has an incredible memory, and can remem More...

I love Card's writing - his characters always have so much depth and are so believable.

In a way, that's what made this story a bit difficult to read (well, listen to, since I got it from the library as an audio book). One of the important characters is a religious fundamentalist in the most extreme fundamentalist way possible, and he was so true to life that it made me squirm. In true Card fashion, though, there was depth even to that character.

This is not a long story - somewhere between short More...

For those who have never read the "Ender" series by Mr. Card, this book has a few points which can be confusing (what are Buggers and what did the comment mean by over the limit for children?)

For those who have read every one of the "Ender" stories, this short novella actually bridges the gap between the science and pragmaticism of the other books, and gives us a glimpse of Peter Wiggins - the childish villain of the first book. It then takes us on a journey through the mindset of a minister who More...

The Little Bookworm

A short novella from the Enderverse focuses on Dink Meeker and the small act of giving a Sinterklaas present to one of his friends. Little does he know that this is going to incite a war among the Battle School students. Zeke Morgan comes from a fundamentalist Christian family. His father preaches that everyone is full of sin and that is why they cannot hear the Lord's Word. He "purifies" Zeke, but knows nothing of Zeke's phenomental metal abilities until the Fleet come for Ze More...

The best thing about this book is that it made me want to read Ender's Game again. The worst thing about this book is that it made me want to read Ender's Game again.

What I mean: this is a light and fun read, but too often I felt it was more of a sketch of places and characters than a fully-drawn portrait. So on the positive side, it made me long for the experience of reading Ender's Game and gave me an itch to re-read that book; but on the negative, it made me feel, not having read Ender's Game More...

Kyriakos Katsamakis
English 3
Period 6
5-26-11
A War of Gifts Review
In this science fiction book the main character, Zeck Morgan, lives in North Carolina with his family. His father, who is the antagonist of the story, is the minister of his own church and that Santa Claus is evil. Even though Zeck’s father also teaches him to be a pacifist he beats him almost all the time. Zeck is very smart and has almost perfect memory so the international fleet wants to take him to battle school, which is l More...

A nice, fun addition to the Enderverse. It is quite short, I easily read it in one evening. This book is less about battle school and the whole war effort, and more about kindness and cooperation even in an environment designed for competition. Ender is a relatively minor character till late in the book, and instead the story is told from the point of view of Zeck, a religious pacifist forced to learn war, and Dink, who feels battle school is a flawed system and longs for the time when he can ma More...

I am definitely an Ender Series fan! I read all the Ender and Shadow series books except this one and "Ender in Exile" about five years ago and was just immersed in them. So naturally, I was thrilled to find a couple of additions to read.

"A War of Gifts" is almost a long short story. It takes place at battle school during the time Ender Wiggin was in the Rat Army. It also takes place around Christmas time. The children in battle school are not allowed to celebrate religious holidays or even part More...

This was a very quick read (which is fine), although I would have been peeved if I had not checked it out from my library and paid brick-n-mortar prices for it.

The story fit nicely with the Battle School era, although I wasn't sure Mr. Card portrayed the characters in quite the same manner. Col. Graff was the only adult referenced and his role would have better suited someone lower on the command structure - like Anderson, perhaps?

I won't give anything away, except to say that Ender's solution s More...

While Ender was in Battle School, there was another boy there named Zeck, who grew up in a very religious household, and doesn't want to be practicing war. When he notices two of his classmates observing a religious tradition that's supposed to be disallowed, he raises a stink and causes a larger conflict over whether religious observances should be permitted.

I normally only buy this author's books used, but in this case, even if I didn't... I probably would have only bought THIS one used. I was More...

Just in time for the holidays - a novella telling a story with a Christmas setting that happens early in the Battle School era, when Ender and Dink and the other boys are still establishing their relationships and showing strengths and weaknesses. Enter a new prodigy - Zeck Morgan, a boy with a photographic memory and an upbringing in an ultra-orthodox Christian home. We are introduced to Zeck's fanatical preacher father and his devoted but more gentle mother; as the boy is taken from them to ba More...

No sé que tienen los libros de la saga de la Escuela de Batalla de O.S.Card para fascinarme de esta manera.

Es un relato corto que tiene lugar en los principios de la era de Ender en la Escuela de Batalla. Salen varios personajes de la saga.Se nos presenta a Zeck Morgan, un niño con la habilidad especial de no olvidar nada, todo lo que ve/oye/lee/aprende se le queda permanente en el cerebro. Y es extremadamente religioso.

El protagonista de este relato es Dink Meeker, al que ya conocíamos de libro More...

This was a pretty good add-on to Ender's Game. This story takes place somewhere in the middle of Ender's Game when Ender is first on an army. Two Dutch students exchange gifts for Sinterklaas Day and set off a struggle in Battle School about what is religion and should the students be allowed to participate in religious or cultural practices at the school. The main character in this novella is Zeck, a boy from a fundamentalist Christian family who has a father that used to beat him to make him " More...

This was a book I found at a dollar store, of all places. It is a small, short book, and I read it very quickly. It's a small addition to the massive Ender Universe, so if you've read "Ender's Game" or are familiar with the story, you may find it interesting. It takes the topic of religion and religious holidays, and adds it to the battle school where brilliant kids are learning to become brilliant commanders. The only problem is, religion and holiday celebrations aren't aloud in battle school. More...

This small book is a collection of ten chapters of an ongoing story that are really ten different short stories (very short; one of them is only two pages long) that overlap Ender's Game in the sense that they are about Ender or one or more of the other characters (at least one of which is not mentioned in Ender's Game, so far as I recall) involved with the Battle School training program. As I said, it is short; I read the book during a few hours on a rainy afternoon, when I should have been wor More...

Okay, I was pretty disappointed with this book after reading Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow. This is a very short somewhat scattered companion piece to the previous books. I'm assuming this was some sort of holiday release. The first section with Peter and Ender's mother seemed tacked on and had little to do with the rest of the story. Ender was barely in the book and the main characters were two dimensional at best.

This is a very skippable effort by Card. He is capable of much better work tha More...

I've read this story twice and I had very different experiences. The first time I read it I had just finished off the other Ender stories so I found this story to come up wanting. Last week, though, I read it again after taking a long break from the Ender and Bean universes and this time I really appreciated it. The big difference was that this time I was not focused on Ender or Dink Meeker, but instead was able to really follow Zeck, the real main character. I was able to see his faults and his More...

This is an Ender Christmas parable. It seems to be like a little "bonus" story from the life and times of Ender, and it's an exceptionally quick read. Compared to the other Ender and Shadow books, this book seems to be aimed an a younger audience, so when I started reading it, I was thinking of encouraging my daughter to read it, too. I'm having second thoughts, however, because, even though the story is less complex, there are more of what my daughter calls "bleep words" in it than in the other More...