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Shadow of the Giant

By: Orson Scott Card
Narrated by: David Birney, Scott Brick, Full Cast
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Summary

The Ender Saga continues with Shadow of the Giant, which parallels the events of Ender's Game from a different character’s point of view.

Bean's past was a battle just to survive. He first appeared on the streets of Rotterdam, a tiny child with a mind leagues beyond anyone else. He knew he could not survive through strength; he used his tactical genius to gain acceptance into a children's gang, and then to help make that gang a template for success for all the others. He civilized them, and lived to grow older. Then he was discovered by the recruiters for the Battle School.

For Earth was at war—a terrible war with an inscrutable alien enemy. A war that humanity was near to losing. But the long distances of interstellar space has given hope to the defenders of Earth—they had time to train military geniuses up from childhood, forging them into an irresistible force in the high-orbital facility called the Battle School. That story is told in two books, Orson Scott Card's beloved classic Ender's Game, and its parallel, Ender's Shadow. Now, in Shadow of the Giant, Bean's story continues.

Bean was the smallest student at the Battle School, but he became Ender Wiggins' right hand, Since then he has grown to be a power on Earth. He served the Hegemon as strategist and general in the terrible wars that followed Ender's defeat of the alien empire attacking Earth. Now he and his wife Petra yearn for a safe place to build a family—something he has never known—but there is nowhere on Earth that does not harbor his enemies—old enemies from the days in Ender's Jeesh, new enemies from the wars on Earth. To find security, Bean and Petra must once again follow in Ender's footsteps. They must leave Earth behind, in the control of the Hegemon, and look to the stars.

THE ENDER UNIVERSE

Ender series

Ender’s Game

Speaker for the Dead

Xenocide

Children of the Mind

Ender in Exile

Children of the Fleet

Ender’s Shadow series

Ender’s Shadow

Shadow of the Hegemon

Shadow Puppets

Shadow of the Giant

Shadows in Flight

The First Formic War (with Aaron Johnston)

Earth Unaware

Earth Afire

Earth Awakens

The Second Formic War (with Aaron Johnston)

The Swarm

The Hive

Ender novellas

A War of Gifts

First Meetings

Browse more titles in the Ender Wiggin series.
©2005 Orson Scott Card (P)2005 Audio Renaissance, a division of Holtzbrinck Publishers, LLC
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Critic reviews

"The novels of Orson Scott Card's Ender series are an intriguing combination of action, military and political strategy, elaborate war games, and psychology." ( USA Today)

What listeners say about Shadow of the Giant

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    5 out of 5 stars

Absolutely Capitivating

Probably my favourite book of the series. Highly interesting and engaging. An excellent ending to the series.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

Let's me forgive the last two in the series.

This book redeems the previous two books in the series and I am now happy that I finished the "Shadow" series. The storyline speeds up and improves in this book compared to the previous two offerings and the whole saga is nicely rounded off.

I still hold that by writing these Shadow books, OSC has undermined the original four "Ender" books, mainly eroding the strength of character and actions of Ender and Peter Wiggin. This is a shame, as these two characters had been so well worked on and developed by OSC in the original series that they each had a magically unique aura by the series end.

Nevertheless, reading the eight books has been a great experience and I would strongly recommend reading the first seven to reach this brilliant book. I will probably continue with the other 3 books in what has been termed the "Enderverse".

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

The Bean story is loosing steam

This third Bean book is not as good as the first two, but still a good story. If you have enjoyed the first two, keep going. Temper your expectations and you will enjoy it, no doubt.

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1 person found this helpful

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Just amazing!!

Scott is such a great writer that I genuinely care about all the characters he creates as if they are real people in my life and that's the first time I'm experiencing this kind of connection to a collection of stories 10/10 👌

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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Amazing simply amazing

This entire series is great. If you can read it all and not be blown away, hapoy and sad at the end I will be amazed.

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The last piece in the puzzle. Good ending on serie

IT is a good ending for the shadow series and for that time period in the ender saga

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

The most religious intolerant book I ever read.

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

One of the most raciest and religious intolerant things I have ever read. Although I knew before lessoning that Mr. Scott was a Christian missionary and is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints but the amount venom written in this book against Islam made me feel sick. I could not imagine that a Christian can carry so much hatred in his heart but then maybe Mr. Scott think by being religious intolerant that he will be continuing his missionary work as a writer but I don’t think that this process is effective.

Could you see Shadow of the Giant being made into a movie or a TV series? Who would the stars be?

I hope not

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars

Slightly better, but still a shadow on Enders Game

Finally, the series of Bean has been completed. The series started off so well, but really trailed off. The conclusion was pretty predictable and took some time to reach that conclusion.



The audio itself is not too bad, nothing to write home about. If you have read to this book, you may as well continue and complete the series.

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2 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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Babies babies

don't get me wrong, I am a parent, but this is way too mormon-centric for an atheist to enjoy :(

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1 person found this helpful

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    1 out of 5 stars
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Kinda Islamophobic

The book focuses on portraying Islam as a ‘fake’ religion because people were ‘forced’ to believe Allah or be killed by their neighbors.

The ender book series is plagued by the authors ideology. Ruining the main concept of the series with his Christian ‘values’

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