Orson Scott Card: Empire and Hidden Empire

[Zarn Ishtare]

As a long time fan of Crisis/Doomsday/Post-Apocalyptic fiction and Orson Scott Card, I highly recommend both of these books as real flagships of the Near Future genre. As well as being a military and political drama, it also gives snap-shot portraits of the protagonists homelife and family, allowing faith to play a subtle but pivotal role that only increases in the second book of the series. Has any one else sampled this latest great from Mr. Card?

[SnoringFrog]

I've read both of these, and I loved them. One of my favorite parts between the two books was definitely

[spoiler]When the main character of Empire (Reuben, I believe his name was?) is suddenly and unexpectedly killed with very little fanfare about it, and then the novel shifts to the secondary character as the new main and keeps trucking along[/spoiler] The tenacity of it is something I haven't found in many books, or, if it is there they do too much with it. This took that situation fairly realisticly, in my opinion.

I'm having trouble remembering much of anything from Hidden Empire right now other than the basic plot and the ending, so I can't really say anything about it. I do recall enjoying it, at least.