Ender's Game

In order to develop a secure defense against a hostile alien race's next attack, government agencies breed child geniuses and train them as soldiers. A brilliant young boy, Andrew "Ender" Wiggin lives with his kind but distant parents, his sadistic brother Peter, and the person he loves more than anyone else, his sister Valentine. Peter and Valentine were candidates for the soldier-training program but didn't make the cut—young Ender is the Wiggin drafted to the orbiting Battle School for rigorous military training.

Ender's skills make him a leader in school and respected in the Battle Room, where children play at mock battles in zero gravity. Yet growing up in an artificial community of young soldiers Ender suffers greatly from isolation, rivalry from his peers, pressure from the adult teachers, and an unsettling fear of the alien invaders. His psychological battles include loneliness, fear that he is becoming like the cruel brother he remembers, and fanning the flames of devotion to his beloved sister.

Is Ender the general Earth needs? But Ender is not the only result of the genetic experiments. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway for almost as long. Ender's two older siblings are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. Between the three of them lie the abilities to remake a world. If, that is, the world survives.

These book club questions were originally from the web site of Spokane Is Reading, the community reading program of Spokane, Washington.

Book club questions for Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

Use these discussion questions to guide your next book club meeting.

“Ender’s Game” has often been cited as a good book to read by readers who are not fans of science fiction. Why does it appeal to both fans of science fiction and those who do not usually read science fiction?

Ender’s childhood is unusual. Does a person robbed of a “normal” childhood have any possibility of stability as an adult? Does Ender have any chance of living “happily ever after?”

Do you think that Ender’s Game challenges your understanding of how children behave? What does Card think marks the distinction between child and adult?

How does Ender’s continual belief that he is like Peter affect his development? How is Ender like and unlike Peter? How does empathy play a role?

Peter appears to be the personification of evil, but, as Locke, he acts as a good person. How does Card treat the concept of good versus evil in “Ender’s Game?”

The Buggers communicate telepathically using no identifiable external means of communication. Was it inevitable that war would have to occur when two sentient species met but were unable to communicate?

Is “Ender’s Game” really about war?

Think about the ethics of Earth’s solution to the previous invasions. Does the threat to Earth justify the Battle Schools?

Why do you think Battle School training involved playing endless games? Did the games do what they were intended to do?

Why doesn’t Ender leave the Battle School? Why are there so few girls in the Battle School?

Why do you think that they kept breaking up the groups every time Ender got his command together? Was this truly productive in making him a better commander?

Talk about some of the other characters in the Battle School. Bean and Petra, how are their roles in the story important?

Was the ending realistic? How would a different ending have affected the tone of the novel? What other ending do you think might have been possible?

Ender's Game Book Club Questions PDF

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