So I guess Ender’s Game is just a genre now? Or more like a conceit we all can agree it’s ok if we borrow liberally from. I have decided two things: one, it is because it’s been 35 years now. And two, Ender’s Game is quite novel in a lot of ways but also borrows heavily from other sources as well.
So this book, from the writer of The 100, is kind of like Ender’s Game but more like Ender’s Game meets….the narrative style of, well, The 100, but there’s also some Harry Potter in there and also The Hunger Games?
Anyway, we follow four students from multiple different planets (colonies of colonies in the far-off future) who all go to an intergalactic defense force academy. This is the first year that candidates are brought in from all four colonies instead of the just the primary ones — the other colonies are plagued with well, plague, but also poverty and pollution.
So 20 from each arrive with their own inherent biases and individual experiences. This leads us to the set up for the whole academy. A little known enemy far off has committed various violences against these colonies, and this is about their defense.
As we join the four characters in their first year, we learn that things are more complicated.
I can’t say this is, well, good, but it’s pretty compelling and it’s an interesting world. It’s clearly a pitch for a series — which, sure — but also maybe a pitch for a tv show. And except for how expensive it would be could be pretty good.
The four characters are the overachiever from the main colony, the rogue who’s pretending to be his dead brother, the kid from the poor planet and oh, he’s gay, and the girl from…..the ENEMY’S planet!
Otherwise the only real issue is how much is skimmed over and how much happens in a kind of reflective cursory way.
(Photo: https://www.amazon.com/Light-Years-Kass-Morgan/dp/0316510440/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=light+years&qid=1557184075&s=gateway&sr=8-3)