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Speaker for the Dead  By  cover art

Speaker for the Dead

By: Orson Scott Card
Narrated by: David Birney,Stefan Rudnicki
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Publisher's summary

In the aftermath of his terrible war, Ender Wiggin disappeared, and a powerful voice arose: the Speaker for the Dead, who told the true story of the Bugger War. Now, long years later, a second alien race has been discovered by Portuguese colonists on the planet Lusitania. But again the aliens' ways are strange and frightening...again, humans die. And it is only the Speaker for the Dead, who is also Ender Wiggin the Xenocide, who has the courage to confront the mystery...and the truth. Orson Scott Card infuses this tale with intellect by casting his characters in social, religious, and cultural contexts.

This, the author's definitive edition of the sequel to Ender's Game, also includes an original postscript written and recorded by the author himself, Orson Scott Card!.

Browse more titles in the Ender Wiggin series.
©1986, 1990 Orson Scott Card (P)2002 Fantastic Audio, an Imprint of Audio Literature

Critic reviews

  • Hugo Award Winner, Best Novel, 1987
  • Nebula Award Winner, Best Novel, 1986

"The most powerful work Card has produced. Speaker not only completes Ender's Game, it transcends it." (Fantasy Review)

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What listeners say about Speaker for the Dead

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

The Enderverse

This is my favorite science fiction series. The characters are easy to identify with, and you will find yourself sucked into this imaginary universe, nicknamed the Enderverse by fans.

Recommended order of reading (in my opinion): Ender?s Game, Ender's Shadow, Shadow of the Hegemon, Shadow Puppets, Shadow of the Giant, Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, Children of the Mind. Reading the books in this order will keep you interested and keep the story moving more naturally.

If after reading all of these wonderful books you are still itching for an Enderverse fix then read First Meetings. The list above is sorted by the Enderverse timeline. Meaning that the flow of events in the stories are uninterrupted. If you were to read the books in the order they were published, you would bounce back and forth in between time and few of the plot twists in future books would be revealed before you wanted them to be known. First Meetings, however contains short stories that occur both before and in between the list above within the Enderverse.

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199 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • AB
  • 02-13-08

The Anti-Ender's Game

I picked this book because I had very much enjoyed Ender's Game and "Speaker" is the continuation of the story. However, it is also completely different in speed and style. While "Ender's Game" is mostly science fiction of the technical kind (spaceships, battles, etc.) and moves along well most of the time, "Speaker" is a tedious, slow-as-molasses study of religion, family relationships, childhood neuroses, and endlessly repeated sermons on tolerance. The passages in Portuguese, on the Catholic teachings, and others are tedious and boring.
You may end up liking "Speaker", but it won't be for the same reasons you may like "Ender's Game". Be forewarned.

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70 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Great story, but the performance was dreadful

After having read "Ender's Game," I was eager to read "Speaker for the Dead." I was definitely not disappointed. According to interviews with the author, Orson Scott Card, "Speaker for the Dead" was the original book that he wanted to write. He wrote "Ender's Game" as a kind of introduction to "Speaker for the Dead." Although "Ender's Game" has become far more well-known and more popular than "Speaker for the Dead," I can see why this was the story that the author really wanted to write. The story is much richer and deeper. I feel as if it's written for a more mature audience, and its themes reflect that maturity. Don't get me wrong. I loved "Ender's Game," yet I think I enjoyed "Speaker for the Dead" just as much--only for different reasons.

Let me get the bad news out of the way. The audio recording of this book was terrible. I don't want to say that the actual performance of the narrators was bad because it really wasn't. The problem was that there were just too many narrators, and they were used inconsistently throughout the book. At times, there were shifts from one narrator to another mid-paragraph, and it didn't seem to be done for any reason. I certainly don't want to say that this lessened the story in any way. After all, it's the same story whether listening to one narrator or 50. Even so, the shifting back and forth was distracting. As if that weren't bad enough, there was also periodic background music that was played during the performance. Again, this seemed to show up in random locations. There was one location in particular in which music just started playing mid-sentence and the ended in the middle of the following sentence. Usually, I expect some of that background music to signal a change in chapter, theme, or something else recognizable. That was surely not the case here. Again, it didn't lessen the story, but it was distracting. It wouldn't be such a bad thing for the story to be re-recorded without the performance issues.

Now, on to the good news. This book takes place 3000 years after "Ender's Game"; however, thanks to space travel at relativistic speeds, both Ender and Valentine are still alive--and in their 30s! In many ways, this book picks up not long after "Ender's Game" concludes. Ender has now become the Speaker for the Dead. After the events that occurred earlier in his life (in "Ender's Game"), he decides to dedicate himself to speaking the death of other people. Perhaps he sees this as atonement for his earlier life. In this book, humans have discovered a new, alien life form, the Pequeninos (also known as "piggies"), on the planet Lusitania. A death occurs on this planet, and Ender is called to speak the death.

This book is far more philosophical than "Ender's Game." The Speaker for the Dead does not deliver a traditional eulogy for those who have died. Instead, he speaks the truth. This concept resonated strongly with me because I think a lot of people don't get to have the truth spoken at their funerals. While this idea of speaking for the dead is a central theme of the book, there are many others. For example, the interactions between the humans and the piggies is extraordinary. It frames the way in which we, as humans, look at anything or anyone who is different from us, as something that needs to be either protected or changed. We seem to think that we are the most evolved species and, subsequently, the most intelligent. Although the book doesn't necessarily contradict this belief, it does make the reader question it. Finally, I want to also mention that the Catholic Church is alive and well in the far-off future. There were very interesting discussions of religious themes throughout the book. The Catholic Church has a prominent role on Lusitania, and it must somehow align its teachings with the new reality of an alien life form.

Overall, this was an enjoyable read. It still exists in the same general universe as "Ender's Game," yet it is its own story. The more mature philosophical themes make this a great book for older readers, but it's still science fiction. This seems to be a great combination, and I look forward to reading other books in the Ender series.

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55 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

As implied by title: Not Ender's Game

I enjoyed this book, but I enjoyed it because I did not expect Ender's Game proper.

There was a lot about Ender's Game I enjoyed, but I can sub-categorize all my favorite parts into two important distinctions. Military strategy and group leadership versus interpersonal development and politics.

If you really only enjoyed the military portions of Ender's Game, then you may consider leaving Speaker of the Dead out. Scott Card wrote Ender's Game so he could write Speaker for the Dead. The way he writes the characters in Speaker for the Dead I have found to be a reliable measure for his other books in the Enderverse.

Reading about waging a war is awesome because of the absolution both sides of a war feel, a solidarity under one banner, so to speak. At the end of war, we have fractured absolution and limited solidarity -- complex topics to say the least.

Speaker for the dead is about this post-war universe. The threads of religion and science woven throughout the personalities is beautifully done in a way that should be neutral enough to spawn debate, but with the author's beliefs only somewhat veiled. Reading a book like this often makes me feel we are more predictable in groups than we are when left to our private choices.

This book gives weight to the phrase "where there is a will, there is a way." Of course -- not all wills are good ones ...

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34 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Listen to the Speaker

<U>Speaker for the Dead</U> is a terrific sequel to <U>Ender's Game</U>. Where <U>Ender's Game</U> was exciting and suspenseful science fiction, <U>Speaker for the Dead</U> is like Ender himself, all grown up. Where Ender was a brilliant child reacting to the pressures and problems of the IF, Andrew Wiggin, the Speaker for the Dead, brings wisdom and maturity to the character we all came to love in <U>Ender's Game</U>.

Terrificly narrated by Stefan Rudnicki and the rest of the awesome Fantistic Audio players, I highly recommend this book. The Afterword by the author is also helpful in putting the first two books of series in perspective.

Orson Scott Card has created a terrific universe with his <B><U>Ender Wiggin</U></B> series. I am proud to say that I discovered it here on audible.com and look forward to listening to some of the later books in the series soon.

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31 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

A brilliant book

I listened to Enders Game and really loved it. Orson Scott Card is a fabulous writer. So when it came time to download a new book, I got Speaker for the Dead. And again I loved the book.

The author manages to create a completely new society and social structure of another species on a far away world. The interaction between the humans and this other species makes you question your own assumptions about people of other cultures. How much of our current world tension is a result of true incompatibility and how much is due to just misunderstanding the other culture?

So the book has that whole deep "hmmm" thing going on and it's just entertaining. It's got enough mystery to keep you guessing about how situations will turn out. A sentient computer "program" named Jane adds another element of interest.

As with Enders Game, this audiobook used multiple narrators. They all did an excellent job with the exception of a way overly dramatic female. I found I couldn't wait 'til we moved on to another narrator. Sorry lady. Turn down the acting knob a little. Even with Little Miss Drama, this book is well worth listening to.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

Good story, okay narration

First, this isn't Ender's Game. It's an entirely different kind of story, so if you're looking for the pseudo-military sci-fi action of Ender's Game, you will be disappointed. That said, this is one of Card's better works, with rich, interesting characters and a fascinating (if slower-moving) plot.

The multi-person reading is not very well done, however. At best, it's distracting; at worst, obnoxious--one of the female readers, in particular, has a habit of reading every sentence as though it's the saddest and most important thing ever written. The book's main narrator is (fortunately) quite good.

Overall, recommended.

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28 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars

Poor follow-up to Ender's Game

For those who read this BECAUSE they enjoyed "Ender's Game": Beware, "Speaker for the Dead" is nothing like it. I loved Ender's Game. It was a suspenseful, delightful, innovative journey with the hero as he brilliantly solved the challenges he faced. Author Card kept the surprises coming as he let you in on the inner workings of the mind of a genius child.
There is none of that in Speaker for the Dead, which is melodramatic without being suspenseful or insightful. Instead, minutia is presented where plot and storyline is what is needed. I never would have made it to the end of the story if I had not read Ender's Game first. On the basis of Ender's Game, I kept reading (listening) hoping that Card would at some point deliver the goods. It never happens.

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars

Not worth the time

First off, this is a review of the "Speaker for the Dead" three-book series, which includes "Xenocide" and "Children of the Mind".

If you're considering this book, then you probably thought "Ender's Game was cool!" Ender's Game tricks you into thinking this book and its series is cool. Assuming you ignore this review, I will now tell your future...

As you finish listening to Speaker for the Dead you will think, "Well, okay. Maybe it will get better." Then, as you finish Xenocide you think, "Okay, it's not going to get better, but I might as well finish the series and see what happens." As you're listening to the long, drawn out, redundant, and contradicting dialogues and monologues of Children of the Mind, your own mind will wander and you will think "I wonder what will be the next book I listen to."

When you get to the end of the last book, when the ending is far less than spectacular, you'll sit and reflect. You'll think and reflect for a few hours about what you took out of the Speaker for the Dead series and you will finally come to your ultimate conclusion........"Well, at least Ender's Game was cool!"

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21 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Amazing!!!!

As much as I enjoyed Ender's Game, I loved this book more. I liked the action of Ender's Game, but it was the inner conflicts and thoughts of his character that I really enjoyed. (Card made me really care about Ender and what happened to him.) It is just this kind of intimacy that I think is the core of this book. It has such emotional intensity with a transcendant spirituality,that made me want to "inhale" this book. I found myself just sitting in my car long after I had reached my destination just to complete another chapter. This book grabbed me and flung me on the roller coaster of its message, and I didn't want to ever get off.

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