30 Day Meme: Day 13
First things first. WHOO BACKDATING!!!!!!!1
DAY 13 > A Fictional Story
For this, I'ma go with a book I read a little while ago and just bought my own copy of today -- Ender's Game. It's the first of a series (the rest of which, I have not read) written by Orson Scott Card, first published in 1985. The Wikipedia summary of the book is as follows:
Set in Earth's future, the novel presents an imperiled humankind who have barely survived two conflicts with the Formics (an insectoid alien race also known as the "Buggers"). In preparation for an anticipated third invasion, an international fleet maintains a school to find and train future fleet commanders. The world's most talented children, including the novel's protagonist Ender Wiggin, are taken at a very young age to a training center known as the Battle School. There, teachers train them in the arts of war through increasingly difficult games including ones undertaken in zero gravity in the Battle Room where Ender's tactical genius is revealed.
I, personally, think the book is a whole lot more than that.
Reading this book mostly on the flights to and from Disney world, and whenever there was random downtime (like at 3 in the morning or right before dinner), it's odd that a lot of this stuck with me as much as it did. I think there's a very heavy psychological side to the book, as in what drives Ender or Peter or Valentine or any other child who comes in and out of the Battle Room, and how warfare and violence affects the minds of such young people. How certain people affect other people. How odd and confusing things seem when you're young and how nothing ever seems to make much sense. Every character plays their own separate role in this novel, in setting up either Ender or Ender's world. Each of them brings something to the table that pushes the story along and gives it more and more depth. Personally, my favorite is Peter Wiggin, Ender's older brother.
To describe Peter in the beginning of the novel in four words: psychopathic, aggressive, cruel, and ruthless. As a boy, he often bullied his sister and brother, almost nonstop. He's incredibly sharp-minded, and very cunning and controlling. He's very manipulative and great at fooling almost everyone around him (save Valentine); for example, he managed to convince his parents that he was perfectly fine and alright, even though every day, to release pent up anger, he'd go out to the forest to torture squirrels (skinning them, shanking them, lighting them on fire, etc.). This, of course, is what drew me to Peter in the first place, because Em does indeed love her crazy characters. However, as the novel progresses (and I believe it continues through the entire book series), Peter...almost evolves. While he is the same Peter Wiggin, he matures and straightens out, eventually becoming a leader of men under the pseudonym of Locke. He's just a very interesting character, and you actually get to see into his mind a bit; I think he's the most developed character in the whole first novel, and if the others are anything like this one, probably the whole series.
LONG POST IS LONG
I DIDN'T MEAN IT I'M SORRY
DAY 13 > A Fictional Story
For this, I'ma go with a book I read a little while ago and just bought my own copy of today -- Ender's Game. It's the first of a series (the rest of which, I have not read) written by Orson Scott Card, first published in 1985. The Wikipedia summary of the book is as follows:
Set in Earth's future, the novel presents an imperiled humankind who have barely survived two conflicts with the Formics (an insectoid alien race also known as the "Buggers"). In preparation for an anticipated third invasion, an international fleet maintains a school to find and train future fleet commanders. The world's most talented children, including the novel's protagonist Ender Wiggin, are taken at a very young age to a training center known as the Battle School. There, teachers train them in the arts of war through increasingly difficult games including ones undertaken in zero gravity in the Battle Room where Ender's tactical genius is revealed.
I, personally, think the book is a whole lot more than that.
Reading this book mostly on the flights to and from Disney world, and whenever there was random downtime (like at 3 in the morning or right before dinner), it's odd that a lot of this stuck with me as much as it did. I think there's a very heavy psychological side to the book, as in what drives Ender or Peter or Valentine or any other child who comes in and out of the Battle Room, and how warfare and violence affects the minds of such young people. How certain people affect other people. How odd and confusing things seem when you're young and how nothing ever seems to make much sense. Every character plays their own separate role in this novel, in setting up either Ender or Ender's world. Each of them brings something to the table that pushes the story along and gives it more and more depth. Personally, my favorite is Peter Wiggin, Ender's older brother.
To describe Peter in the beginning of the novel in four words: psychopathic, aggressive, cruel, and ruthless. As a boy, he often bullied his sister and brother, almost nonstop. He's incredibly sharp-minded, and very cunning and controlling. He's very manipulative and great at fooling almost everyone around him (save Valentine); for example, he managed to convince his parents that he was perfectly fine and alright, even though every day, to release pent up anger, he'd go out to the forest to torture squirrels (skinning them, shanking them, lighting them on fire, etc.). This, of course, is what drew me to Peter in the first place, because Em does indeed love her crazy characters. However, as the novel progresses (and I believe it continues through the entire book series), Peter...almost evolves. While he is the same Peter Wiggin, he matures and straightens out, eventually becoming a leader of men under the pseudonym of Locke. He's just a very interesting character, and you actually get to see into his mind a bit; I think he's the most developed character in the whole first novel, and if the others are anything like this one, probably the whole series.
LONG POST IS LONG
I DIDN'T MEAN IT I'M SORRY