Shadow Puppets

By: Orson Scott Card

Narrated by: David Birney, Stefan Rudnicki

Length: 10 hrs and 45 mins

Publisher's summary

Bestselling author Orson Scott Card brings to life a new chapter in the saga of Ender's Earth and The Shadow Series.

Earth and its society have been changed irrevocably in the aftermath of Ender Wiggin's victory over the Formics. The unity forced upon the warring nations by an alien enemy has shattered. Nations are rising again, seeking territory and influence, and most of all, seeking to control the skills and loyalty of the children from the Battle School.

But one person has a better idea. Peter Wiggin, Ender's older, more ruthless, brother, sees that any hope for the future of Earth lies in restoring a sense of unity and purpose. And he has an irresistible call on the loyalty of Earth's young warriors. With Bean at his side, the two will reshape our future.

Shadow Puppets is the continuing story of Bean and Petra, and the rest of Ender's Dragon Army, as they take their places in the new government of Earth.

Browse more titles in the Ender Wiggin series.

©2002 Orson Scott Card (P)2002 Fantastic Audio

Critic reviews

“David Birney's voice sounds purposefully fatigued, beautifully conveying the world leader Peter Wiggin's frustrated resignation, and Stefan Rudnicki's clipped, low baritone is perfect for the cloack-and-dagger email correspondence that bookends the chapters. Gabrielle de Cuir expertly handles both accents and emotion...[Scott Brick] tackles the Bean chapters with the youthful cynicism and passion that Bean embodies in this book, capturing the character's voice with wonderful passion.” —AudioFile

“The folks at Audio Renaissance have quite literally brought greatness to the text. They've included an introduction and a postscript read by Card himself, both of which place the novel and the audiobook in its context as well as enlightening us to the author's method of its construction. Multiple readers led by Stefan Rudnicki work perfectly to vocally illustrate each chapter, character and scene.” —Science Fiction and Fantasy on Ender's Game(A Science Fiction and Fantasy Essential)

“The ideal presentation of any book of mine is to have excellent actors perform it in audio format.” —Orson Scott Card from the afterword of Ender's Game

Very good completion to Shadow series...

Unlike what "kwimalar" and others wrote, this is a very good book. It does *not* recount events from the previous books, but brings them to the necessary conclusion. I almost didn't buy this book given these reviews, I'm so glad I did because the story would be incomplete without this book. PLEASE, if you like the Bean/Peter/Petra storyline, buy this book. You will *not* be disappointed.

Excellent follow-up

Bean is my favorite character in the Ender universe and in this story, which is really a Stratego game within which our favorite characters operate, Bean finally gets the girl, Petra Arcanian. Petra is my second favorite character and I disagree with the reviewer that said there is too much dialogue and that Card can't write dialogue. He is a playwright first and I find his words magical, especially how he voices Petra, Bean, and the indomitable Colonal Graph. If there is one thing missing from this series, it is the maturity of Peter: we missed the transformation. In "Ender's Game" Peter seems like he could easily become a killer like Achilles, but the focus instead is on his continued insecurity. I would like "The lost year of Peter maturing" as a novella.

The babies

After starting this book, I read a couple of reviews talking about babies and not having gotten to that part, thought they were overreacting. But oh the cringe.. Babies babies babies.. It almost looks forced, and the characters become stupid because of the babies and the story starts resembling a teenage TV show.. Oh and don't get me started on Peter...
So much whine in the performance, the narrator portraying this emo whatnot shift in his character.

Hopefully the following books get back on track.

Another Great Chapter in the Series

This deep into the series I found myself getting a bit burned out of the Enderverse and had to take a break from this book soon after starting, but once I got back into it I thoroughly enjoyed Shadow Puppets. At times I did feel like the deep desire for babies that Petra had was out of character or out of place in the tone of the series, and made her character feel shallower to me than she had previously felt. That said I'm still going to read the next book too.

Great addition to the series

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Overall I found this book engaging and entertaining. My only criticism of this book is a production note, and this is true for most of OSC's books. Why must they put crappy synth muzak in between the chapters do us all a favor and skip the music in the future.

Continuation of the Shadow series

This is just the continuation of the Hegemon's Shadow. It is more of the same as previous book, with moments of deep insight into the character of the human race. What is good and what is evil, all as a backdrop of the story of Bean and Petra.

The best yet

I have fallen in love with this series. Reading them all! And the love of this story!

One of the best!

Of all the books in this series, I think this is one of the best!

Earth stuff/war

The enderverse has an earth, so here we are. Peter pops up again, no bugs, no piggies. Lord of the flies plus war games.

great story - audio was very soft

in love with the shadow series. this book in particular was recorded with the audio at almost a whisper. I could myself turning both my phone and speakers in my car all the way up and still having difficulty hearing while driving. I love the voices and recognize them from previous books but seemed noticeably more faint in this production.