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 like a military academy for all the brigest kids. Zecks mother wants him to go because it’s a way for him to get away from his violent father.
At the school the other students don’t like Zech because he refuses to fight in the battle room, but also because of his religious beliefs. At battle school religious holidays are banned so when Zech sees two boys exchange Christmas day gifts he reports them to Colonel Graff. After Graff talks to them and tells them to stop they rebel by getting everyone to celebrate Christmas. But this time when Zech tells on them Colonel Graff does nothing so he goes to the Muslim kids and tells them that the Christians are being able to celebrate their holidays. Angered by this the Muslim students begin praying daily. The school makes them stop which scares the other students to stop exchanging Christmas presents. After the students find out what Zech did they stop speaking to him and he has a nervous breakdown. Now it is left up to a boy named Ender to help him.
There are three main conflicts in this book. The first one is man vs. man. We see this with Zech and his abusive father. Zech gets beat by his father regularly and never fights back. The second type of conflict is man vs. self. Throughout the whole book Zech wants to defy his father but every time he is presented with a opportunity like fight in the battle room or celebrating Christmas he doesn’t. The third conflict is man vs. society. Zech is a outcast at school because he is a pacifist and because of what he snitched on the other students. Everyone hates him and is against him.
One major symbol of this book is the Christmas present Ender gives Zech. The present is a symbol of defiance because when Zech accepts the gift he defies his dad, who teaches him that Santa is evil.
The theme of this book is that religion isn’t always a good thing. Religion is constantly in the book. Zech strongly believes in his religion which causes him to tell on the other students. This makes all the other kids hate him. Also because of some of his beliefs he doesn’t want to fight and this causes him to become an outcast. We also see the other kids getting in trouble because of their religious practices.
This book was fun and interesting to read. I would recommend it to people who like the ender saga or like the author Orson Scott Card.