General Information
===================
 Title:                  Shadow of the Giant
 Author:                 Orsen Scott Card
 Read By:                Multi Cast
 Copyright:              2005
 Audiobook Copyright:    2005
 Genre:                  Speech
 Series Name:            Shadow Saga
 Position in Series:     04
 Abridged:               No

File Information
================
 Number of MP3s:         159
 Total Duration:         12:26:26
 Total MP3 Size:         171.58
 Parity Archive:         10% PAR2
 Encoded At:             CBR 32 kbit/s 44100 Hz Mono
 Normalize:              None
 Noise Reduction:        None
 ID3 Tags:               Set, v1.1, v2.3

Posting
=======
 Posting Plan:           
 Reposting Rules:        

Book Description
================
The Bugger Wars are over. 
Battle School was a secret military space station where [CENSORED] prodigies 
were transformed into brilliant strategists.  Battle School candidates 
were selected, bred - even engineered - for the ultimate purpose of 
prosecuting a war against the alien Buggers, insectoids who had twice 
before nearly overrun Earth.  Led by Ender Wiggin, these amazing kids 
outmaneuvered the Bugger Hive Queens, annihilating them in the process. 
With the alien threat eliminated, the temporarily united governments 
of Earth have reverted to their old ways.  At the top of the list of 
coveted assets - right up there with nukes, guns and jets - are the 
newly returned Battle Schoolers.  The lucky nations who can claim these 
adolescent geniuses as citizens have a decided advantage; after all, 
who can outthink someone who's Napoleon, Alexander and Robert E. Lee 
all rolled into one?  Ender Wiggin, considered far too dangerous a prize 
to allow home, has been placed out of reach, on an outbound colonial 
starship traveling at relativistic speeds. 
Now, only a few years later, Earth is at the brink of another catastrophic 
world war, as former Battle Schoolers vie with one another for global 
domination. India, united in their insurgency by a living goddess, suffers 
under the cruel occupation of a new pan-Islamic empire.  If the Muslims 
can consolidate their hold in Mother India, it won't be long before 
they'll be at odds with the formidable Chinese.  Russia is a wild card. 
 The United States continues its strict policy of neutrality. 
The job of saving the world from itself falls to Peter Wiggin.  Barely 
an adult himself, and ironically a Battle School wash-out, Ender's older 
brother is Earth's Hegemon, a sort of international policeman who's 
more than a diplomat and less than a dictator.  Blackmailed into assisting 
the Hegemon in unifying the world - hopefully, with no bloodshed - is 
Julian Delphiki (nicknamed "Bean"), Ender's former lieutenant.  The 
once-diminutive Bean now suffers from a life-threatening form of giantism, 
an unfortunate side-effect of the same genetic tinkering that gave him 
his towering intellect.  Can he and wife Petra succeed before Bean's 
condition becomes fatal?
Orson Scott Card has made an unintentional career in plying the waters 
created in his "Enderverse."  Not that he hasn't published plenty of 
successful non-Ender novels; it's just that fans can't get enough of 
Ender, Peter, Bean and the rest.   Ender's story played out over the 
course of four novels, and now the background events on Earth have taken 
the foreground in the Shadow series, of which Shadow of the Giant is 
the conclusion.
While Ender's Game is most memorable for Card's ingeniously played-out 
battle sequences, Shadow of the Giant plays out like an unhurried international 
chess match.  While Ender's Game was very much about [CENSORED]hood and the 
cruelty of growing up too soon, Shadow of the Giant is very much about...parent-
-
ing.   Perhaps not too surprising, considering that Card has himself 
matured from the hungry young writer of the mid-to-late 70s, to a uncharacteris-
-
tically (for a science fiction writer) conservative Southern dad.  
The story zips about from Brazil to Rotterdam to Damascus to Hyderabad, 
but it's not driven by action.  A great deal unfolds as a slow-boiling 
wrestling match amongst competing interests: Bean and Petra desperate 
to recover their brood of kidnapped in vitro fetuses; Caliph Alai, reluctant 
leader of all Islam, hoping beyond hope to discover a way to rescue 
intolerant Islam from itself; the living Hindu goddess Virlomi, following 
in the footsteps of Gandhi to liberate her nation; and the space-bound 
International Fleet, forbidden to interfere in Earthly affairs, nonetheless 
pursuing a long-view strategy aimed at guaranteeing the survival of 
the human race and finding happiness for their Battle School [CENSORED]ren. 
 Above it all is Peter, the much-misunderstood Hegemon, hoping to find 
a way to grow humanity beyond the need for war.
Shadow of the Giant has been produced, unabridged, on CD by Audio Renaissance. 
 Attractively packaged and vividly rendered by a "cast" of a half dozen 
talented readers, the presentation is nonetheless a bit confusing.  
Sometimes the voices trade off at the end of a chapter; sometimes after 
shorter sections; and sometimes they engage in conversation as if reading 
a radio play.
World government is an eternal theme in science fiction, but rarely 
is it presented as anything other than a fait accompli.  The scenario 
is naive in places, seemingly preposterous in others, but it's refreshing 
to see an author tackle this subject instead of skipping ahead to its 
potential aftermath.
And it's not all dry politics punctuated with high-tech bloodshed.  
First and foremost, Shadow of the Giant is introspective and emotional 
- the last quarter of the novel is as tear-jerking a denouement as you're 
likely to read in a science fiction novel.  And it's a fitting capper 
to one of the most ambitious series in recent memory.