Philotic Web

Hi guys,

I just wanted to chat a bit about people's favorite reading orders, ideally what they think is the best way to read them the first time through.

I'm working on it as a section for my website, Trade Reading Order, which is all about organizing pulp and geeky books (mainly comics right now). I'm also reading through the series again in prep for shadows in flight (and I haven't read Ender in Exile or Shadow Puppets) while my Fiance is reading all the books for the very first time.

Here's the Ender's Game Reading Order as I've got it so far. It's mostly chronological by the events in the books, but I'm honestly not sure about the placement of War of Gifts - it's not that it doesn't take place around that point, I just feel like it might disrupt the flow too much. Maybe just because after completing it I felt like it really wasn't my favorite book.

It's been interesting to see how the reading order changed in the book releases as well. In my copy of Ender's Shadow, the books are listed in total chronological order. In my copy of Shadow of the Hegemon, the books are listed closer to what I have (the shadow books coming between Ender's Game and the rest of the "Ender Quartet"). The copy of War of Gifts lists them like that too, but then with Exile and War of Gifts after... which makes little sense to me.

So what do you guys think? I've never met anyone who actually read the Bean books between the Ender sequels and I'm about to hand my fiance the next book.. so I gotta make a final decision!

(as a total afterthought, since this is my most given away book through the rest of my life, I picked up a pile of them at a flea market recently - so I'm going to be giving away 8 copies of the book through my site. I know you already have a copy, but I thought I'd let you know anyway in case you really want one to give to a friend or lost yours. I'll be posting about it on the blog soon, though I haven't decided what the process for choosing will be. In the past it was random or first email.)

If it's your fiance's first time reading, I'm inclined to suggest they read the books in order of date of publication. OSC wrote the Shadow series with the intention to invoke subtleties which he included in the Speaker series. Having already read the Speaker series when beginning the Shadow books, in my opinion, totally increases enjoyment of the Shadow series.

For the most part, though, I'm ambivalent about reading order with the exception of Ender In Exile- my father got into the Ender series independently of myself and read Ender In Exile directly after he read EG, to my disappointment- as many of the characters included in Ender In Exile are built up by the Shadow series. I'm sure you realize that, though, sendingsignal. It's sensible enough, as I'm sure you are haha

But yeah, to digress, I recommend reading in order of publication.

Interesting, I hadn't caught any reference to the original sequels yet. I read them a while apart though. This time through I may catch it more easily.

Any you can point out?

You know, other than subtleties probably best described as easter eggs such as the use of the word "Piggies" in Shadow of the Giant, I can't think of much of anything. I'll think about it and if I can think of any more specific references I'll get back to you. Hopefully someone else that reads this can think of a connection for me.

I want to amend something about my previous post, though. I realized a while ago that I actually read ES before moving on to SFtD. I remember it was an impulse decision that was based on the desire to read something as novel as a parallax to EG. If I could redo it, I think I would have skipped ES and commenced with the Speaker books, or else revisited ES before moving on in the Shadow books (why I didn't do that is beyond me).

this time around I've gone straight from ES to Shadow of the Hegemon. It seems like it's working pretty well. I noticed a "piggies" drop in this one too - when bean is decoding petra's message.

Just finished reading Shadow of the Giant, the only one of the shadow books I hadn't read yet. ending totally got me - tearing up and everything. bah.

so I'm probably going to take a little break before going to the next books on the list, since it's such a good place to rest on, but I'm pretty excited to see how it flows in this order (since I've almost totally forgotten the stories of the original sequels.) I feel like it might be really great to read it this way for the first time, since you wouldn't know if peter would be successful, not firmly, and there's more invested in the characters, I think.

Hard to say. It's definitely a series that can work in more than one order.

Personally, I'd read them in the order that they were published. But then again, maybe its just because I'm not a huge fan of the shadow books. Its not that I dislike the shadow books, I really felt that ES cheapened EG. Here I spend my whole childhood almost worshipping Ender, just to have OSC write Bean as being so much better than Ender. That being said, i thought the series got progressively better as the series went on. I actually really enjoyed the last shadow book.

That being said, next time I reread the series, i plan on reading them in chronological order. EG, ES, the other shadow books (I get the names mixed up), EiE, next maybe the short story about jane, then the speaker books. After that, maybe the rest of the short stories.

I'll be sure to let you guys know what I think. Don't hold your breath tho, it might be a while before i get around to it. Many books to read, not enough time....

I'll be sure to let you guys know what I think. Don't hold your breath tho, it might be a while before i get around to it. Many books to read, not enough time....

yeah, i didn't think I'd be this far in my re-reading already. I got more into the shadow books then I was last time. Probably because I hadn't read the ender quartet books before, and it seemed reasonable to focus on bean and petra so much.

Honestly though, the greatest achievement of those books is how much I came away thinking that peter is my favorite of all of them. I empathized with him more than any other character, by the end of giant.

For me the reading order could be compared to the star wars movies- Sure, Episodes I, II, and III HAPPENED first, but I don't understand why would you watch them before IV, V, and VI.

I don't really get this obsession people have with reading things in chronological order when it wasn't written that way. It makes the most sense to read things how they were written, since even though those books take place in the "past" they reference things that are going to happen, and you're supposed to already know what it's foreshadowing.


It's like reading Magician's Nephew before The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. You should get the the end of Magician's Nephew and go "Ooooh! That's why the wardrobe leads to Narnia!"

Well, these ones seem to work this way, anyway.

I have to report that this read through has been very enjoyable following this order. If I followed release order, Ender In Exile would be last?

Honestly, I like ending on the original three sequels, they're really the most powerful books here.

Jayelle actually has a pretty good point. Why read them chronologically? I read them SORT OF in the order they came out (I wouldn't recommend reading them in this order.)

EG --> EiE --> ES --> SftD --> Xeno --> CotM --> SotH --> SP --> SotG --> FM --> WoG

Of course, if you want to read them in truly chronological order, you'd have to start reading First Meetings, then switch over to Ender's Game (While switching almost every other chapter with Ender's Shadow), read War of Gifts a few chapters in to EG, then start Ender in Exile, finish the Shadow series, finish Ender in Exile, finish First Meetings, and then read the rest of the Ender Quartet.

Jayelle actually has a pretty good point. Why read them chronologically? I read them SORT OF in the order they came out (I wouldn't recommend reading them in this order.)

EG --> EiE --> ES --> SftD --> Xeno --> CotM --> SotH --> SP --> SotG --> FM --> WoG

Of course, if you want to read them in truly chronological order, you'd have to start reading First Meetings, then switch over to Ender's Game (While switching almost every other chapter with Ender's Shadow), read War of Gifts a few chapters in to EG, then start Ender in Exile, finish the Shadow series, finish Ender in Exile, finish First Meetings, and then read the rest of the Ender Quartet.

I read them in that order, except I put Ender's Shadow before Ender in Exile. I figured since ES takes place at the same time, why not read that one next?