Speaker for the Dead Review

Speaker for the Dead is a novel by Orson Scott Card, written in 1986. It concerns the tale of Ender Wiggen, sometimes called the Xenocide, sometimes called the Speaker for the Dead. He is called the Xenocide for his instrumental role in the defeat of the Formics, an alien race perceived to be an existential threat to the human race. He is called the speaker for the dead for his creation of a spiritual religion centered around his book The Hive Queen and the Hegemon. However, Ender the Xenocide and Andrew the speaker are not know to be different people, as they lived hundreds of years apart from each other. Ender has effectively traveled through time by traveling at relativistic speeds, so that time slowed down outside his ship.

The central plot is that of Ender coming toy the Catholic colony planet of Lusitania. The planet is under a specific charter from the starways congress to be a Catholic colony and have complete religious autonomy. They are, however, not allowed to forbid the coming of a Speaker for the Dead, who they consider him to a religious perfunctory. The Speaker for the Dead is requested by a young woman to speak at the funeral for her husband, and to tell truly of his drunken abusive ways. Through the telling, and resolving other conflicts on the planet, the whole town comes to learn a higher way of living, and are healed from their many psychological wounds.

I really enjoy this piece because it deals with very complex issues about religion, moral relativism,  and the healing power of truth. The Catholic bishop tells his people to ignore and scorn the Speaker, but the truth he speaks and the peace he brings are too powerful for the people of the colony to ignore.

The people of the colony live with the only known sentient alien species, called the Pequeños. They are small, pig-like creatures in a tribal state of development. They, over the course of the novel, murder several of the people of Luisitania in a ritualistic manner. It is revealed near the end of the piece that they believed that killing them would move them into the next life as trees. When they find out this is a trait unique to the piggies, they cry in shame and horror.

Overall, I really enjoy this piece. I like the plot and the characters, as well as the overall themes and ideas. I would highly reccomend it to people who enjoy the sci-fi genre as well as religious themes in writing.