Speaker for the Dead

Extract: This being the review of a sequel, be aware it contains spoilers of its predecessor.

The sequel to "Ender's Game" is another difficult book to read. It continues the story of Ender as a 35 year old man, though it takes place 3000 years after the events of the first book, thanks to relativistic travel. As a way of atoning for his leading military forces to destroy the "buggers", he becomes a Speaker for the Dead, a person called upon at a person's death to speak to the life of that person, the good and the bad. He did this initially when he finds a larval queen bugger who communicates with him telepathically and explains the history and intentions of the race. Ender recorded this in a book, anonymously using the name Speaker for the Dead. The book became a sensation, inspiring others to become speakers.

Humans now live on one hundred planets, one of which is Lusitania, colonized by a mission of Brazilian Catholics and home to the pequeninos, or "piggies", the only intelligent life discovered since the xenocide of the buggers. When Pipo, the lead xenologist (alien anthropologist), is murdered by the piggies, one of his assistants makes a request for a speaker. Ender, being the closest, fulfills the request, uncovering a dysfunctional community and piecing together the biological and sociological mystery that is the piggies...