Reviews - Govornik za mrtve

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1.98k reviews for:

Govornik za mrtve

Orson Scott Card

4.07 AVERAGE

nkarthouse's review against another edition

5.0

A very engaging murder mystery. Ender is better at diplomancy than any Star Fleet captain.

emilyplun's review against another edition

4.25

reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

carolinepritchett's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous challenging emotional inspiring tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

scooter_pi's review against another edition

Boring and pretentious

docmon2025's review against another edition

3.0

Speaker for the Dead is an interesting story, but the way it's written made it hard for me to fully become involved in the story. Part of this is due, I think, to the fact that it was first published in 1986. At that time, science fiction was still being written (generally) how it had been for decades: using the omniscient point of view, focusing on the action and events of the narrative, with little attention given to description of characters.
So we have no idea what most of these characters look like. I want at least some attention given to characters (and most readers today expect it), including how they look and what they're thinking. But it was jarring that each character's appearance was just a black hole. Especially when dealing with an alien species, there needed more attention to character description.
Because we're only given a small window into anyone's internal thoughts, many events seem to happen out of the blue or hadn't been earned, such as

Spoiler

Ender and Novinha's marriage

.
The lack of insight into the characters is one reason I dislike omniscient point of view. At the start of every chapter, you have to first figure out who's pov we're reading from. But of course, the pov doesn't stay with one person, and that always feels like head hopping to me. And it keeps the reader at a distance, which I felt throughout the story.
The life cycle of the piggies was fascinating and provided an interesting twist at the end. But again, the lack of description left me wanting. The narration seemed to hover just above what was happening, rather than immersing me in the story.