The Last Shadow

De: Orson Scott Card

Narrado por: Emily Rankin, Gabrielle de Cuir, John Rubinstein, Judy Young, Justine Eyre, Kirby Heyborne, Orson Scott Card, Scott Brick, Stefan Rudnicki

Orson Scott Card's The Last Shadow is the long-awaited conclusion to both the original Ender series and the Ender's Shadow series, as the children of Ender and Bean solve the great problem of the Ender Universe—the deadly virus they call the descolada, which is incurable and will kill all of humanity if it is allowed to escape from Lusitania.

One planet.

Three sapient species living peacefully together.

And one deadly virus that could wipe out every world in the Starways Congress, killing billions.

Is the only answer another great Xenocide?

This program is read by Emily Rankin, Gabrielle de Cuir, John Rubinstein, Judy Young, Justine Eyre, Kirby Heyborne, Orson Scott Card, Scott Brick, and Stefan Rudnicki.

A Macmillan Audio production from Tor Books

16 years too late and just rubbish!

This was my last book from Orson. I guess sometimes it's time for an author to retire before it gets this bad. Otherwise a fantastic performance from the narrated team!

Not Card's best, but ...

The story isn't among Card's most genius works, but it's still worth your time - and a must-read if you're a fan of the enderverse.

The adio production is sadly among the worst I've heard from Audible. The main bulk of the book is luckily read very professionally, but parts are very badly performed, the sound quality is variable and there are even shockingly abrupt inserts of phrases that were apparently omitted in the original file.

Y'all ridiculous

The book was good. Different from the other Ender and Shadow books but still decent. The author did run a bit wild with this one but nothing crazy or illogical. I never liked the idea of instantaneous travel, seemed like magic but that's about it. I read so many bad reviews about the book I thought it was going to be a dumpster fire. I went in biased against the book but ended up becoming engrossed and a bit disappointed it ended. This one did feel a bit rushed compared to the others but it was still enjoyable.

great capstone book

I have been a fan of the enderverse for many years. I like how this book was written as if pulling quotes or passages form previous books. I have missed several books in between but can recall many parts of previous books that I have read when subjects are reintroduced. in this one.

Not his usual standard

I was pretty disappointed in this one. The story was rushed, and was not very cohesive. It wasn't bad by any means, but a lot of the content didn't make much sense in the greater Enderverse. I didn't care for a lot of the plot points, and there didn't seem to be a greater resolution to the story

One of the things that I enjoyed most about Mr. Card's work before it was the philosophy that was interjected into the story. It always flirted with the line between pretentious and meaningful, but as the story unfolds it becomes more and more meaningful. There was a lot of philosophy involved in this story, but was nowhere as deep as in other Enderverse stories.

Worth a read. I will probably only read it once however.

Bedtime story of pooping birds

Very disappointing. A whole species of 4 handed humanids/ reengineered human beings we meet ONE! And A STORY TELLER !Two talking intelligent bird species to go with the piggies formics and Jane.Dr Dolittle lives. Deus ex Maquina cosmic rays cause the descolada virus. “Detouring“ to die with the leguminides. The classic Ender novels had central to them mental health issues. This story only entertained dysfunctional hyper intelligent gratuitous bloviating kids. I awaited fanfiction to fulfill the promise of the ender verse

decent closer

was not sure what to expect from this book but the story overall turned out okay though I really would have preferred things to conclude with finality probably means the rights will move to another author and we'll see more stories from this in the distant future time will tell long fans of this series shouldn't be too disappointed

Closure But Not Perfect

Card finally gave us an ending to two series and though not what I was hoping for it has made me content to read the end.

some minor audio chops but still a fantastic exper

it's a satisfying end to much loved stories. the performance had some minor blips but not enough to ruin the experience

As bad as good literature can get before being bad

Lets get this out of the way first: Should you listen to this book if you have listened or read the whole Enderverse before that? I'd say yes. This will give some sense of closure. However, for me it was at times really difficult to keep on listening. Remember endless family bantering in earlier books? Yes, it's back. The grandchildren of bean are characterized in ways that defy any psychological logic and those characterizations seem to be needed to produce endless bantering. I found it both boring and not credible. The character of the reborn Ender in Peters body makes no sense whatsoever, feels completely absurd and I don't know what this character is doing there in the first place. Furthermore, there are a couple of new characters, which are not needed for the story and just make it feel cluttered.
Moreover there is again, as in earlier books this "droning on", which I don't know if it comes from the written word or the narrators. It didn't even put me to sleep, because if was too annoying.
But what surprised me most was really just the problems mere writing skills. In dialogs there is an endless "he said, she said, they said" like there was no other word but "said" or "asked" to recite a dialog. It really comes across sometimes like a high school essay. Cheap hack writers who throw out 5 books a year write more beautifully by a margin. And this from Card? I don't understand it.
The purpose of the descolada Virus is explained and it is very obvious that the writer needed to correct an earlier mistake he made to do so in a way he found to make sense. His reasoning is explained in a personal note in the end. He has obviously not read the three body problem, since that would also help make sense for the descolada virus.
That being said, the most interesting thing in the book is indeed the personal note of the author in the end. I like the guy, he feels likeable and humble to me. Also, I believe he is quite religious, I'm not, but I never felt a single strain of dogmatism from any of his books. The opposite: There seemed a spiritual openness to be coming through and I thought this was very classy. I'm really sorry I can't give a better review, but listening to this book really was not fun. It felt off in so many places I wouldn't even know where to start.