Ender’s Game is a brilliant story about character development

Ender’s Game is a story about a young boy who volunteers to train and become the world’s final leader/commander against an invasion of a hostile alien race. He is isolated and pushed to the edge in order to prepare to fight off the final wave of the Invasion.  He makes friends and allies and even accidentally kills for his and the world’s survival.

Written by Orson Scott Card, the story centers around characters that all go through shifts in personality, actions and how they interact with each other after years of being isolated from each other. Ender and his sister Valentine’s relationship is specifically  shown to have a significant impact after Ender is drafted to train. Before Ender’s departure, he was shown to be weak and defenseless against his sadistic brother, Peter, and was defended by Valentine. By the time Ender returns to her, she is working with Peter and Ender is now tougher than he was 4-5 years ago.

This change in personality over time is what really seals the deal for me. Peter is another example of personality shifting in a character. He starts off abusing his siblings and mentally torturing them. By the middle-end, he finally respects them and gains their trust. Although the book overall is amazing with how it conveys its characters, some parts could be taken out due to confusion. One example of a part that puzzled me was Peter and Valentine’s sudden team-up and interest in creating political profiles. I wasn’t really on board for it and sort of threw me off, as the book doesn’t give hints as to when this mini-story continues. But this part of the story pays off at the very end, with Valentine eventually revealing what would have been Peter’s final plan. 

This story is like no other book I have read. It is truly one-of-a-kind book that executes its characters in fantastic motion. I recommend this book highly to anyone, especially teens and young adults.