If you got Ender's Shadow I suggest reading that next. It helps with some of your questions from Ender's Game. I don't know for sure if Card meant to write the books the way he did, but it works out awesome.
If you are going to read the Ender Series go Speaker of the Dead, Xenocide and then Children of the mind.
If you read Shadow I don't suggest reading the Shadow series unless you are just obsessed with Bean (I am and was and didn't really like them that much).
Personally I like Ender's Shadow the most but I am in the minority there. I just related to Bean more than Ender.
I think that this, like with a lot of books, it depends on where you are in your life when you read them. I think that Ender's Game should be required reading in High School to introduce kids to what Sci Fi actually is and also I think it is as close to a modern day Catcher in the Rye as I know of.

P.S. I also love Risky Boards!

Here's what I have, in no particular order:

Ender in Exile
A War of Gifts
Speaker for the Dead
Xenocide
Children of the Mind
Shadow of the Giant
Ender's Shadow
Shadow Puppets
Shadow of the Hegemon

The only one I didn't get that was on my list was First Meetings.

So you suggest reading Ender's Shadow, then Speaker, Xenocide, and Children?

Yeah. Shadow is the same story as Ender's Game but told from a different point of view and the other three are what happens with Ender after the war. If you have all the shadow series read em. They aren't horrible, just not great. The Ender series is good but people have different reasons for why. I love Xenocide because it brought up a lot of my Anthropology crap and it is another thing I can put down when asked what I have ever used my major for.

Order they were written in. I will brook no debate on this topic. After you finish the original series you can decide if you have the patience to read all the much later written money-grab books, which are alright on their own merits. Don't in any case read Shadow immediately following Ender's Game.

Electric Monk wrote: Here's what I have, in no particular order:

Ender in Exile
A War of Gifts
Speaker for the Dead
Xenocide
Children of the Mind
Shadow of the Giant
Ender's Shadow
Shadow Puppets
Shadow of the Hegemon

The only one I didn't get that was on my list was First Meetings.

So you suggest reading Ender's Shadow, then Speaker, Xenocide, and Children?

That's the order I read them (just recently too), and I have Shadow of the Hegemon on the shelf from the Library.

Speaker was OK and did kind of get me hooked to read Xenocide and Children, but then I really think Xenocide and Children just had too many words and I wasn't really a fan of the ending of Children (much like Game, or perhaps opposite of Game :P).  Same with Shadow, seemed to have just a lot of words, like Card was trying too hard (or as asm says "money grabbers").  Of course after reading the rest, I think Ender's Game could have been expanded and had a deeper story without hitting the too many words problem for a while.

asm wrote: Don't in any case read Shadow immediately following Ender's Game.

What are you talking about, the two books should be read back to back.  In fact, I read Shadow before Ender's Game and really that is how I would do it again if I had to but I would not suggest it to others just because I have a bias towards Bean.

RiskyBack wrote: Scott Lynch is the guy who wrote Lies of Locke Lamora and that is one of my Fav books.  Lies can be read as a stand alone and as it is right now, it should be by everyone!

Great recommendation.  I am just finishing this one up and loving it!

Raptor wrote:

RiskyBack wrote: Scott Lynch is the guy who wrote Lies of Locke Lamora and that is one of my Fav books.  Lies can be read as a stand alone and as it is right now, it should be by everyone!

Great recommendation.  I am just finishing this one up and loving it!

Sitting right next to me now...haven't got too far into it yet (60ish pages), reminds me a lot of Ender's Shadow so far :p, which is so far "eh eh".

Cramchakle wrote: It seems silly to even suggest it to you, Risky, but have you read Starship Troopers lately? (No, not the graphic novel based on the movie of the same name.)

Or any Robert Heinlein novel, for that matter. I seem to recall we had a conversation about Stranger in a Strange land once before...

I've been reading a bit of Heinlein recently myself. If you haven't read it yet, I recommend "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress".

I also think my favorite triology at this time is the Foundation Series by Issac Asimov.

Lies of Locke Lamora is really great!  The start of it is kinda confusing since it jumps around and isn't very exciting but once the actual storyline starts it's a great read. I just re-read it recently and was smiling so much while reading it people thought I started taking medication or something. I ofcourse turned and scowled at them and they realized that they still have no right to speak to me and less right when I am reading (can someone have less than no right?).

I'm reading the First Light series right now and really enjoying it. It's like a combination of Star Trek Voyager, Firefly and that crappy Andromeda show with the dude from Hercules the Legendary Journeys. Got some cool SciFi ideas in it and some interesting characters but the story is kinda outrageous. I find myself trying to suspend my disbelief in how stuff works out and just enjoy but the author really just wanted to get to the story he wanted to tell so he just kinda took some shortcuts.
I know, that sounds silly when I'm talking about a military space adventure set in a post-apotalyptic Earth world, but I think you all can understand what I mean.
And now I will re-recommend Andrea Court Novels. The first one, Emmissaries from the Dead was good and I really liked the main character for how unlikable she tries and succeeds at being, but the second book, The Third Claw of God was really fun. It was like a SciFi Agatha Christie book. Granted, not anything that will change your life, but they are good and fun reads and a person can get obsessed with Andrea Court (I have).

I also think my favorite triology at this time is the Foundation Series by Issac Asimov.

Amen.

I found Lies of Locke Lamora to be interesting, but disapointing. He builds up a bit of back story about the girl Locke loves, and the general back story is gradually catching up with the current events throughout the book, so you would expect that the stories would converge and the girl would appear... but no, the book ends, and no girl. Also painfully lacking are any significant character development, moral quandaries, real emotions of any sort from the characters (and Locke is the only real character). In the end it is basically just a somewhat dry book about a theif and his crew.

Yeah, the bit about the girl was frustrating. She kept on being brought up as if she was going to be a centerpiece and it never materialized. I disagree with you on the character development but I can see where you are coming from.
Lynch, like his friend Matthew Stover, came from writing novelizations of movies and TV (Star Wars, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Star Trek) and I think that shows much more in his books than it does in Stover's. His website says there are going to be 8 books or something so I think he planned on just turning out books to get the whole story out there ala Laural K Hamilton (horrible) but after he met with success and wrote the second one and didn't get the success he kinda just decided to stop.
As a writer myself I can tell you that having an idea for a series is much more difficult than just writing a stand alone book. You have to use foreshadowing for stuff you want to bring up later but you can't overdo it so that it takes away from the story you are telling. I guess with Lies I got so caught up in the caper that I didn't really think so much about the non-related stuff but now that you mention it, I am sort of annoyed but that really doesn't change my feelings about the book. I'm a big fan of it.
Try reading Heroes Die by Matthew Stover, I'd really like to know what you think about that one.

RiskyBack wrote:
As a writer myself I can tell you that having an idea for a series is much more difficult than just writing a stand alone book. You have to use foreshadowing for stuff you want to bring up later but you can't overdo it so that it takes away from the story you are telling. 

I think you should simply use The Matrix as your model for success. Each of the sequels was successively loads better than the previous movie. If the Wachowski brothers can do it, anyone can.

/s

Yes, The Matrix Reloaded was quite the tour de force. That means sucked, doesn't it? I don't really speak French

I thought the tour de force was a jedi knight bicycle race through the streets of Quebec.

M57 wrote: I thought the tour de force was a jedi knight bicycle race through the streets of Quebec.

You mean this?

Yeah, the bit about the girl was frustrating. She kept on being brought up as if she was going to be a centerpiece and it never materialized. I disagree with you on the character development but I can see where you are coming from.

Well, I should clarify, there IS quite a bit of character development, but it is all in the back story.  I didn't mean to sound as negative as I did, the story is quite interesting and well written, it just lacks some of the elements that would give it more "dimension".

not sure if anyone suggested Guy Gavriel Kay. he was on the radio today (could have been a repeat broadcast) and Guy sounded like he knew his shit. If you havent read his stuff you might want to give it a try. but if you have I'm planing to pick up a book of his so maybe you have a suggestion for me.

For a whole array of scenarios that merit the RiskyBack touch, I'll nominate the Vorkosigan series, by Lois McMaster Bujold.