Rating: 
Summary: A good book but not Ender's Game
Review: I would assume that most readers of this book would be those who recently read and were excited by Ender's Game. If you are a fan of Mr. Card's writing then you will probably enjoy this book - but BEWARE! It strays quite a bit from the light story telling and fun of Ender's Game and is a much "darker" book.I enjoyed it, but only when I looked at it on it's own merits and not as a sequel to Ender's Game. Unfortuately, Ender's Game is a must read if you are going to really follow the characters and story in Speaker for the Dead. I guess it's hard to follow Ender's Game - but did Mr. Card have to take such a turn away from what made Ender's Game great? Still a good read on it's own merits - just don't have Ender's Game-type expectations.
Rating:
Summary: Great Sequal
Review: I've always found most sequals to have little or nothing to do with the original. I've always read the first book, then gone right on to read the second only to be gravely dissapointed. This was not lite that at all, though. You do not need to read the first book in this series (Ender's Game) to know what's going on in this book (though I would- it gives you a bit more background and it's an amazing book). This book is so cool in that it's science fiction (not my favorite) but it has great mystery elements, some romance, and cool anthropology and biology stuff in it. Unlike the first book, Ender's Game, this book does require a more sci-fi mind. You have to be willing to put the limitations we have in our world today on hold and let your imagination go with this book. At times, it was a stretch for me because I do not tend to like science fiction and things that don't seem possible. But this book, like Ender's Game, didn't feel so out there that I wasn't thinking of it as something that could happen. This was a great book. I read it like it was possible, because it felt possible, but yet the things that were happening obviously have not happened and could not happen with the technology we have now. The characters feel real and everything that happens to them you feel and can totally empathize. The story is a great one, and the little twists in the story make it all the more exciting. This is not only a great sequal, but it is a great book by itself. Speaker for the Dead does a wonderful job of creating two very different species and developing their differences and simmilarities. Another great book in the series. The Ender Series is terrific!
Rating: 
Summary: This is a way awesome book!
Review: I enjoyed Ender's Game, so I read the sequel. I think Speaker for the Dead is better then Ender's Game. I think this is the best book in the Ender Series (Children of the Mind is a close second). This book deals a lot with the characters, and that makes it really good. I really recommend this book!
Rating:
Summary: More a beginning than a continuation
Review: Let me just start by saying that the Ender Saga is by far my favorite book series, just as Ender's Game is my favorite book, and Orson Scott Card my favorite author.
While "Speaker for the Dead" is technically a sequel, I see it more of a new beginning than a sequel. The only connection it really has with Ender's Game is in the last chapter of the novel, and with two of teh characters. The rest is a copmletely different story.
What I like about this new trilogy (Speaker for the dead, xenocide - which I think is the best one, and children of the mind) is that it almost becomes philosophical and intellectual. Not that sci-fi generally isn't, but it has something that Ender's Game lacked. Real issues. Though-provoking ideas. Intellectual points. This series made me stop at several points and just *think*. Not necessarily about the storyling, but about the points the book made.
Orson Scott Card proves not only to be a master at sci-fi, but also quite an intellectual guy. Ender's Game is to this series as The Hobbit is to Lord of the Rings. Not all that much to do with it, but it really immerses you into the story.
This trilogy is truly a magnificent one, and I recommend it to absolutely anyone who enjoys Sci-fi, intellectual ideas, and Ender's Game. You may have noticed two other books classified under Ender's Saga: Ender's Shadow, and Shadow of the Hegemon (also coming soon: Shadow Puppets). These are basically of a different series (and with the third coming, I suppose it could be classified as a new saga). Which one would you prefer? To answer that, ask yourself this question: which part of Ender's Game thrilled and stimulated you the most: the part at Battle School, where Ender was climbing to the top and reigning victorious over everyone else with his brilliant mind and strategy -- or the last chapter of the book, where Ender found the cocoon, wrote his book, and moved onto a different planet. If you prefered the first, then I recommend you first read Ender's Shadow and Shadow of the Hegemon before the other trilogy. If you really enjoyed the last chapter, and it left you breathless, then by all means, move onto Speaker for the Dead and this brilliant trilogy. You will NOT be dispapointed.
Rating: 
Summary: Sloppy and anticlimactic
Review: While I greatly enjoyed Ender's Game, I had heard that Speaker for the Dead was an entirely new experience and not very much of a sequel in spirit. That said, I am not basing any of the following statements on the (justifiable) bitterness a wide departure from the original can earn a sequel. Speaker is just not very well written. I say this with regret as a fan of Orson Scott Card. The motivations of the main characters are unbelievable. They either react with entirely too much emotion at the drop of a hat, or stand by idly while their world collapses around them. This is aggravated by the fact that Card tries too hard to use Portuguese. It's not that his command of the language is wrong, I have no idea whether or not that is the case. But rather characters flow into their 'native language' at the most cliche of times purely for dramatic effect. It is very poorly done. The flow of the story is awkward. The conflict/mystery is presented well enough, but a huge amount of time goes by while the main character deals more with interpersonal relationships than with the major plotline. By the time Card gets back to the meat of the story, you'll greet it with a shrug and an "Eh.." The climax itself suffers because of all this- the mystery starts to sputter out and nothing really happens, especially considering the way Card handles space travel and communication. The ending is slow, and left me wondering whether I should have waited to buy the next novel in the series.
Rating:
Summary: Truely worth reading
Review: Read this book. It IS that simple. Read this book.
Rating:
Summary: hardly a sequel
Review: 'Speaker for the Dead' is called a sequel, but with only 2 characters from the original, it could most likely stand alone. I put off reading this book for a few years, because I loved 'Ender's Game' and just didn't think I would enjoy 'Speaker'. I finally read it last week and finished it in a few days, staying up reading at night. It was impossible not to keep reading, basically because is it a total page turner. I love how the scientists notes, reports, and memos are at the beginning of each chapter, each unraveling more of the mystery. And the mystery is great! The end, while not like the tortured end of Ender's Game, is happy yet strangely so for a book so filled with death and sadness. In reading this book, I certainly did not get what I expected, but what I did get was a mature novel written wonderfully. While I very much disliked parts of it, the end result was amazing.
Rating:
Summary: Less action, more philosophy.
Review: As the Ender series progresses, Card's novels become less focused on action and more focused on the underlying philosophy of this universe. If you liked Ender's Game and are looking for something similar, this might not be perfect for you. However, if you really enjoyed Ender's Game and are hoping to experience more of that world, I definitely recommend it. Card presents some very interesting ideas as he weaves a highly enjoyable tale. For mature readers who enjoyed EG, I highly recommend this book and the rest of the series.
Rating:
Summary: A moving exploration of truth and conformity
Review: After reading Ender's Game, I was intrigued enough to get the sequel. This book displays a more mature author's voice, and is not just a story of first contact. It explores the secrets we all keep and the devastating impact of the lies we tell in our families and social groups. When Ender starts speaking the truth about what is going on under the surface, he opens up a lot of pain for the families in the story, but also allows healing. And the book clearly and compellingly evokes the pain and cost to the truth-teller in doing so. I felt enormous empathy for all the characters, and the book caused me to examine where I am not telling the truth in my own life and in my own family.
Rating:
Summary: Grabs hold and doesn't let go
Review: Speaker for the Dead is more mature than and, in my opinion, superior to the prequel Ender's Game. In order to partially atone for the xenocide he committed in Ender's Game, Ender Wiggin now spends his time traveling to various planets to speak for dead people upon request, usually many years after the death due to the relativistic effects of near light speed travel. Before each speaking, Ender researches and attempts to figure out what the dead person would have said about his or her own life. Well, that's mostly what Ender's been up to since his Battle School days and how he's been able to learn extraordinary empathic skills, but it's not what this book's about despite the title! A new intelligent alien species has been discovered on a planet called Lusitania, where a small Catholic community of Portuguese colonists has established the settlement of Milagre, partly in order to be isolated and safe from non-Catholic influences. The community now includes two scientific posts: a xenologer who studies the aliens (the humans call them piggies due to their appearance) and a xenobiologist who primarily works on improving agricultural productivity on this alien world. One fateful night transforms the colonists' perceptions of the piggies. The aliens torture and butcher Pipo the xenologer in cold blood, keeping him alive as they open his body with a wooden knife and remove organs. Soon after, Ender is called to speak Pipo's death by Milagre's young xenobiologist named Novinha, who was very fond of Pipo. Novinha is crucial to the story because she has sole access to computer files holding the terrible secret of why the piggies killed Pipo; she has sealed them with multiple layers of security to prevent others from learning the secret and dying the same way Pipo did. Due to relativity, Ender's voyage seems to take about a week for him but when he lands on Lusitania twenty-two years have gone by. Novinha is a widow with a large dysfunctional family. Her late husband Marcao has died of a strange congenital disease. Pipo's son Libo has met the same horrible death as Pipo at the piggies' hands. But otherwise, nothing much has changed. Not much significant progress has been made in learning about the piggies. The real reasons Ender comes out to Lusitania and leaves his beloved sister Valentine behind are to understand the piggies and explain them to humankind and to carry out a promise he made to the one remaining survivor of the species he destroyed at the end of Ender's Game. But he gets more than he bargained for when he encounters this mysterious race whose ways are completely different from our own. Once again, Ender pulls off the impossible by revealing their mysteries. And in doing so, Ender turns the whole town of Milagre upside down! It's a great plot the whole way through and a couple times I had to force myself to put the book down to do other things (minor things like eat, sleep, go to work, etc). I liked Ender's Game but this one definitely surpasses it for adult readers. Very highly recommended!
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