A fitting, satisfying, and dignified conclusion to the series. Loved every minute of it. ( )

The perfect ending to the Ender series. Card brings more color and detail to the end of Ender's and Bean's time on Earth, and fills in with loving detail the life of Ender's older brother, Peter. ( )

The only book ever to bring tears to my eyes. You got to read book 5,6,7 before this to get the full impact of this wonderful series. ( )

It was nice to get to know Alai even better in this book, and to get glimpses into the voices of some of the other battle school kids.It was a little weird for me that Card left Randyll un-found.And I was never really convinced as to why Bean couldn't have stayed on earth, or Petra gone with him. Was it just to round out Peter's story and give him some humanity? I'm not sure Peter deserved Petra, or that he needed rounding out.I wonder if Card will write any more books in the enderverse. I'd like to know what happened to Bean and the kids on the ship. ( )

This series started to got to off track for me. ( )

A satisfying end to the Bean chronicles. Card's ability to tell vastly different types of stories (compare the Shadow series style with the Speaker series style) while consistently proving entertaining is absolutely amazing. ( )

This last book in the Bean series had some interesting points including the development of the Battle School students into world leaders. However, I felt like this and the last book could have been combined into one. I also was not satisfied with the ending which I felt left the door a little too wide open for more books about Bean. ( )

I just didn't like what happens between Bean and Petra and the babies in the end. I really like Orson Scott Card's ability to flesh out characters the way he does, but many times I wish he'd give them happier endings. Or endings with a little more closure. ( )

This is another of Card's books concerning Bean, and the time after Ender left Earth, while Bean struggles to keep the world from being taken over by Battle School dictators, and Peter. Very interesting to those interested in the Ender universe, and the full story of the Wiggin family, and Bean. ( )

This is the fourth book in the "Bean" series, which begins with the events of Ender's Game, but remains on Earth and follows the friends Ender left behind. By now, the children of Battle School are in their teens, and nobody would argue that they're still children. Bean and Petra have some of their own, in fact... they just don't know where they are. Alai's Caliph of the Muslim world, Virlomi's running India, and Han Tzu ("Hot Soup") is emperor of China. Oh, and don't forget Peter Wiggin, the Hegemon - it's his job to make sure the Battle Schoolers don't destroy the world. This book is a satisfying conclusion to the series' issues of world history, although you're left (not unpleasantly) wondering what happened to a few of the characters at the end. ( )

Unread ; just begun ; too many materials to get thru return to Hennepin ordered from Dakota.

End of an era, old Bean.

The adult Battle School types here demonstrate they are not without their own problems and flaws, as they decide what they should do to leave Earth in a better state than it is.

Bean also want sto look into the kid conspiracy, as well.

Peter Wiggin features, too, but just an average book.

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2007/10... ( )

Absolutely Satisfying!! Fabulous book.. ( )

I typically don't like to read all the books in a series too close together, especially when the series is coming to the end. However, I must say that I waited too long because I could hardly remember anything that happened in the preceding book, Shadow Puppets. Bean is such a tragic character and I came to love him almost as much as Ender. ( )

http://jmgold.blogspot.com/2007/06/sh... ( )

Ender's Game parallel novel, exploring the fate of Battle School graduates and Peter Wiggin on Earth. Blah blah politics blah poor dying Bean blah weird enshrining of heterosexuality. Yep, it's OSC. I almost want to reread Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead to see if I'd hate them now. ( )

This is the 4th and supposedly last novel for Bean. It was a good story and followed the other 3 books very well. The ending could be an ending, but seemed more like an opening for 2-3 other/new story lines with MANY possibilities. I was not satisfied with the ending and if Card does not plan to follow the stories opened up by this book I will be VERY disappointed.

Overall the book was a fun enjoyable read not nearly as serious as the previous ones. There was some character development, many loose ends tied up and a soft ending obviously leading into another storyline entirely. ( )

This book is crap. There, I've said it. Card is a good writer though, especially concerning the psychological element of his novels, but the political processes and events in this book remind me of what one Isreali said of the Left Behind books which characterized events in Isreal: "This wasn't the Israel I live in."

He writes that all the Muslim countries of the world somehow magnificently unite into a caliphate. What is he smoking? Iraq and Iran bonding? Saudis and Palestineans uniting? Sudanese and Libyans joining forces? Would Card write something equally strange about Christian nations, such as them uniting into a superpower: no. Obviously not because he understands the large differences in opinions among Christians, but not so with Islam. He thinks the Muslim world is a shapeless mass, ignoring a thousand complexities. This is the pinnacle of Science Fiction- politically motivated ignorance?

That's only one example. This book is simply crap. Card's insane worldview on modern and future politics make the rest of the book impossible to suspend disbelief in. ( )

I read this on the back of the rest of the series so I was interested to see how it was going to pan out. I read it pretty quickly, it was certainly a pacey read and kept me interested. I have to admit, I didn't like the ending all that much, I didn't want Bean to go off into space and not know what happened to him after that. It would be nice to see what his future has in store and how he manages to cope with three babies! ( )

Very disappointing, very weak.
Card has succumbed to Tom Clancy's disease (which was earlier caught by Robert Heinlein) where he has come to believe that his readers desperately care about the author's views on history and religion and want them expostulated at length through every possible mechanism: through the flow of the story, through expository paragraphs, through speeches the characters recite to each other.

This would be bad enough if these views on history and religion had any content, but they are laughably weak.

In Card's world, conflict occurs because of a few bad apples that somehow manage to take control of nations; eliminate the bad apples and the national rivalries disappear.
In Card's world Christianity is unmitigated good; the evil things done in its name again the work of a few bad apples. Since this is a post 9/11 novel he feels free to state clearly what he only hinted at earlier, that Islam is pure evil; he never quite squares this with the bad apple theory of history, but in the case of Islam we do very much get the feeling that it's everyone causing trouble, not just the leaders at the top.
Finally we even get a gratuitous swipe at Hindus as simple-minded idolators who are stupid enough to believe that a person could be a god (when we all know that that happened 2000 years ago and isn't going to happen again until the rapture).

Of course none of this would be complete without the rah-rah-rah American exceptionalism stuff:
* it's American's who repeatedly save the world (but always in the background and without asking for thank you) even though
* good old America has nothing to do with the repeated wars of these books, and does nothing to start or exploit them, and,
* at the end, when America refuses to ally itself with every other nation on earth, well, America is special so who can blame them for that?

Card's world appears to be much like King George the Torturer's world, a world where no-one like John Perkins (Confessions of an Economic Hitman) exists, and where it's a bizarre mystery why most of the world hates America.

This is all very sad given how compelling were Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow.

In summary, if you have a mental age of 12 and don't mind the over-written weepy family stuff, it's an OK potboiler.
If you're no longer a teenager, don't waste your time. ( )

Another Bean book in the ever-expanding Ender series. ( )

http://interactivereader.blogspot.com... ( )

Lots of political maneuvering, but not a lot of real action. Definitely the end of the Bean saga. Where will OSC go from here? ( )

Ender's Game stands as a classic of science fiction - but I don't think that this, or any of its sequels, will ever rate next to it.

As the concluding volume to both Bean's story and the Enderverse (at least I hope), it does wrap things up and provides a sense of conclusion to the story. But - I read this a few months ago, and I've already forgotten most of it. There wasn't anything especially memorable or notable about this story or it's characters. There's nothing jarring or terrible about the book, but there's nothing great about it either.

I imagine if you're interested in this, it's because you read (and loved) Ender's Game, and have already read the three direct sequels as well as the three prior "parallel" novels about Bean. If that's the case, there's no reason to stop there and not read this. But I wouldn't say that this is a stunning conclusion worthy of where it all started with Ender's Game. ( )