Speaker for the Dead (Ender's Saga, #2) in Ender's Jeesh

Mar 26, 2016 Porter Sprigg rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites, science-fiction

This is my favorite novel. It's a ringing declaration of empathy, reconciliation, and hope that our world desperately needs to hear. Re-reading it can't quite capture the mysteries (as you already know the twists) but the emotional resonance remains. I'm excited to write my thesis on this book.

Just finished it again in 2021. It continues to challenge me and resonate with the themes I see at work in our culture. We need truth telling and reconciliation and we need it badly. ...more

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Feb 16, 2016 Emily rated it it was amazing

Shelves: read-again, favorites, absolute-favorites

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Speaker for the Dead is an incredible novel centered around finding truth in the universe. Taking place three thousand years after the Bugger Wars, in which Ender Wiggin destroyed the first alien race that humanity had yet encountered, Ender is still alive thanks to "lightspeed travel between worlds," which allows him to "skip like a stone over the surface of time" (37). Most of humankind, which has spread to other planets, regards the Ender of the past as a cruel killer for what he did, as the Speaker for the Dead is an incredible novel centered around finding truth in the universe. Taking place three thousand years after the Bugger Wars, in which Ender Wiggin destroyed the first alien race that humanity had yet encountered, Ender is still alive thanks to "lightspeed travel between worlds," which allows him to "skip like a stone over the surface of time" (37). Most of humankind, which has spread to other planets, regards the Ender of the past as a cruel killer for what he did, as the aliens ultimately meant no harm, and few know that the same Ender is alive today, traveling as a Speaker for the Dead, who is called upon to tell the truth about the lives of people who have passed on. Years later, a new race of aliens known as "piggies" is discovered on the planet Lusitania, and people feel they must preserve the race to make up for what humankind did to the other aliens. However, when Ender is called to speak the deaths of two xenologers that were mysteriously killed by the piggies they were studying, he must learn all he can from the people of the Lusitanian colony in order to tell them the truth, hidden under so many lies.
Though there were so many characters in this novel that stood out to me, and I want to discuss them all, I think that my favorite character is Ender. He has remained a very interesting person since the first novel in this series, and his wisdom and knowledge have significantly increased in the three thousand years since he was a child, even though it only feels like twenty or thirty years to him. He has a remarkable ability to deeply understand people in a relatively short period of time, so when he speaks for the dead, he can often have a harsh and very unsettling effect on the people he talks about that are still alive. The truth is very painful for the people of Lusitania, but he does not "inflict the wounds and leave it to others to heal them" (284). Instead, by causing such pain with his words, he earns the gratitude of the Lusitanians for releasing them from their long-hidden secrets and lies, and then stays to help them rebuild their lives, as well as to create a world in which the humans and the piggies can live together in harmony. Ender is such an influential character in the plot that I feel that the author, Orson Scott Card, wanted the reader to strongly connect with the Speaker, as well as everyone else whose lives were touched by Ender.
Speaker for the Dead is an amazing novel that I would recommend to anyone who enjoys science fiction, and I also recommend trying it even if you think that you dislike the genre, as I first discovered that I like science fiction because of this series. Apart from this aspect, though, the novel holds other qualities in its in-depth analysis of the psychology of many of its characters. It was very interesting to follow the explanations of people's motivations for doing certain things, especially why one character, Novinha, put herself through extreme suffering because she felt responsible for the Xenologers' deaths. Ender's understanding of these motivations helped the Lusitanians get through the challenging events that were happening to them, and these explanations made the novel even more interesting to read. Speaker for the Dead was written with impressive creativity and eloquence, and I cannot praise it enough. ...more

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