I read this book in one day (granted, while travelling) so it was good enough to not want to put it down. While it wasn't amazing I am definitely interested in the characters and their arcs. However, I did feel that the writing was a bit heavy handed, childish, and preachy at times. I'm not reading it for the author's craft (if you want that, go run get The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss) but to see where everyone ends up. Ultimately this is the 7th (? wow) book I've read by OSC and it feels like things are getting weaker. However, I'll probably stick it out and read the next one. ( )

Better than Shadow of the Hegemon. Turns out having some plot to go along with people thinking stuff helps. ( )

The magical battle school children and Achilles are at it again. The character of Achilles has jumped the shark several books ago and is even more ridiculous in Shadow Puppets, succeeding in basically kidnapping the world government for himself, despite the fact that he has no support left anywhere in the world.

The geopolitical stuff with the war in Indochina is fairly interesting (now the Muslim coalition is entering the fray), as are Peter Wiggin's attempts to reclaim the Hegemony for himself. However, that is about all that is worth it in this book.

The rest Card dedicates mostly to espousing the Mormon point of view on life. Mainly, to marry and have as many children as possible is the ultimate achievement of any human being and apparently even gay scientists who have been single all their lives eventually come to this realization. As does everyone else who is a good guy in this series. Also, non-implanted, possibly unfertilized eggs in a tube are children, in case you didn't know.

Since this is the case, battleschoolers Bean and Petra are of course compelled to make some babies, like good little Mormons. Despite the fact that they are two of the most brilliant minds left on Earth, they go about it in such an unbelievably incompetent way that the embryos are kidnapped from under their nose in a completely transparent heist. You have exactly one guess who is responsible for this.

It seems to me that with every book Card gives up a little on making the series a well-rounded science fiction story and focuses a bit more on preaching his religious believes. At this rate two books down the line we will probably have a transcription of the Book of Mormon. ( )

Good but not as strong as the previous books. ( )

The Shadow series follows Bean and is a ton of fun. A worthy follow-up to Ender's Game, and a great opportunity to see what happens with the members of Ender's Jeesh, I'd recommend these books to anyone who enjoyed Ender's Game (and how can someone not like Ender's Game?). ( )