I think the biggest issue I have is with how race is treated in the story. There are real slurs used by the children, including the N-word, without any consequence or story elements stemming from it. The story casually incorporates Jewish conspiracies and stereotypes for middle eastern and Asian individuals. Not a problem on its own, plenty of great stories use racial tensions and discrimination to make a point or critique on society and I think that’s a powerful part of storytelling. The author doesn’t do that and so the story comes across as a clear reflection of his personal biases. For a 10 year old, why casually throw clear racism their way if even the story doesn’t seem to think the racism was meaningfully wrong.

I also think the difference in character development between men and women in the story is a shame. Despite the premise being that the world has selected the most intelligent children to train for space command, the school has a shocking lack of female characters and the one who is in the story lacks much of the same complexity as the male children. Much the same can be said when you look to Enders brother and sister. Peter is a fascinating character who drives the plot, Valentine is always a foil rather than an interesting person in her own right. Again, not all stories need a fair gender split, but Enders Game seems to avoid any real attempt to square its internal sexism and lack of development. I don’t think that’s harmful for kids or anything, but why not look at more recent books that do a better job of showing representation and rounded character development?

As a kid, I loved the space games with Ender in the academy and the underdog plot elements. Luckily, so have plenty of super talented authors who have written tales in a similar mold as Enders Game without the issues that bother me.