Ender’s Game is a coming-of-age story on an astronomical scale, no pun intended. In fact, maybe it can’t even be considered coming-of-age, because for Ender childhood barely existed. How can a child suffer through so much pain, emotional manipulation, isolation, and stress? Perhaps that’s what bullies do to kids in schools, as we see with Stilson, but that scenario can hardly be at the same level as an organization of grown-ups melding children’s minds towards violence and power through twisted “games” and careful social maneuvers. Is Ender really what we consider a child? But yet, when Ender does “win” the war against the buggers, he and his friends laugh and cry and finally talk as children do, about going to school. Why is it only when Ender cries do we see him as a child? Are adults not allowed to cry?

He also does have those characteristics of a child that adults are apt to lose in adulthood, which is perhaps the point the book is trying to make. The tactics that are called silly, stupid, and reckless are the ones that help Ender and his army grow and win. You could say one of the only silver linings in this book is teaching readers that a child’s imagination is limitless and should be harnessed. Perhaps not for the mass murder of an alien race, but maybe for others things, such as art. We talked in class how as we grow up, less and less of us create art. And also as we grow up, we fall into these societal codes and procedures that have been set up for us. Ender’s Game challenges us to consider the status quo, and how those that devise new, creative solutions will go the farthest. That’s probably why Ender’s Game works so well as a science fiction novel, and is so lauded. The readers are already those in society going against the mainstream.

As for “Weyr Search”, other than the short notes about the breeding of these dragons and their teleportation powers, I did not see one bit of it as science fiction. It was a fantasy world rooted in the medieval, with dragonmen and lords and harems and ye olde patriarchy. That is, however, except for the weyrwomen. Although there are many moments of a male-dominated society, the weyrwomen stand as a point of contention. The dragonmen follow a woman. The most powerful dragon bonds with a woman. There is something to be said for that, but also something to be said that men, especially Fax, tried to clear all of these weyrwomen out of society.