Xenocide
(Libby/OverDrive eBook, Kindle)

As an armed fleet from Starways Congress hurtles through space toward the rebellious planet Lusitania, Ender Wiggin, his sister Valentine, and his family search for a miracle that will preserve the existence of three intelligent and vastly different species. As a storyteller, Card excels in portraying the quiet drama of wars fought not on battlefields but in the hearts and minds of his characters. Above all, Card is a thinker--and this meaty, graceful, and provoking sequel to Ender's Game ( LJ 2/15/85) and Speaker for the Dead ( LJ 2/15/86) stands as a brilliant testimony to his thoughtfulness. A priority purchase. Copyright 1991 Cahners Business Information.

Card returns to the highly popular, award-winning story of Andrew ``Ender'' Wiggin, the boy wonder who saved humanity from alien invasion and, guilt-ridden over his near-total destruction of the alien species, has now become a sort of traveling conscience. This third Ender novel picks up where Speaker for the Dead left off: on the planet Lusitania, Ender and the other human colonists strive to neutralize the ``descolada,'' a possibly sentient virus that adapts itself rapidly to every attack. Meanwhile, tensions are rising between the colonists and the indigenous ``pequeninos,'' who rely on the descolada for their survival; and the fleet sent by Starways Congress to destroy the rebellious colony closes in with its doomsday weapon. With the help of their family, their pequenino friends, and Jane (an artificial intelligence living in the galactic computer network), Ender and his sister Valentine race against time to resolve these crises. The plot is sometimes compelling, but the novel's many flaws make the book more often dull and irritating. Card's style is openly didactic, and when his characters do veer away from lengthy philosophical and scientific ruminations, they venture into contrived personality conflicts and endless self-deprecation. Some, notably Ender, Valentine and the wonderchild Wang-mu, are simply too good to be true--too smart, too reasonable, too kind and generous. The reader quickly tires of such impossible perfection. (July) Copyright 1991 Cahners Business Information.

YA-- A fitting culmination to the marvelous trilogy that began with Ender's Game (1985) and continued in Speaker for the Dead (1986, both TOR). Once started, Xenocide is almost impossible to put down. It continues the conflicts with the Penuininos (the alien race infected with a deadly virus); the Hive Queen and her workers; and the humans, including Ender, on Lusitania. What makes this title so fascinating are the new characters introduced here: Gloriously Bright and her father/mentor Han Fei-tzu, two of the ruling class on the planet Path. Their Chinese heritage, combined with their ``possession'' by obsessive-compulsive disorder, makes for an intriguing situation. The philosophical nature of this novel may be frustrating for some readers, and hardware fanatics may be disappointed by a solution that ventures into the more speculative realms of physics. For everyone else, however, Xenocide successfully pulls together all of the various themes Card has explored in this series. It will appeal not only to his fans, but also to readers of the speculative fiction of David Brin and Greg Bear. A thought-provoking, insightful, and powerfully written volume that no library should be without. --Cathy Chauvette & John Lawson, Fairfax County Public Library, VA Copyright 1991 Cahners Business Information.