Books like “Ender's Game”

What to read after “Ender's Game” by Orson Scott Card: a list matched by tropes, mood and atmosphere. Under each book you will see what it has in common.

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1
Starship Troopers
Robert A. Heinlein · 1959
Same genre: “Military science fiction”
A young man joins the mobile infantry and is shaped into a soldier through brutal training and interstellar war. Told as his reflections on duty, citizenship and violence, the novel follows his rise from recruit to officer against an enemy unlike humanity.
2
All You Need Is Kill
Hiroshi Sakurazaka · 2004
Same genre: “Military science fiction”
- War Fiction
- Alien Invasion
A young soldier is thrown into a war against alien Mimics and killed on his first day of battle, then wakes on the morning before, again and again. Each death teaches him something, and he must relive the same fight until he can survive long enough to find a way out.
3
Old Man's War
John Scalzi · 2005
Same genre: “Military science fiction”
- War Fiction
At seventy-five, John Perry joins the Colonial Defense Forces, leaving Earth for a new body and a war among the stars. What begins as a chance at a second life becomes a fight to understand the colonies, the enemy and what he is fighting for.
4
All the Light We Cannot See
Anthony Doerr · 2014
Similar setting: “War Fiction”
- War Fiction
- Coming of Age
During the German occupation of France, a blind girl and her father flee Paris for the walled city of Saint-Malo, carrying a valuable jewel. In Germany, an orphan with a gift for radio repairs is drawn into the war machine. Their separate paths move slowly toward the same besieged town in August 1944.
5
The Blue Sword
Robin McKinley · 1982
Similar plot moves: “Chosen One” and “Coming of Age”
- Chosen One
- Coming of Age
Harry Crewe, newly orphaned, travels to a remote outpost on the Darian border to live with her brother. Corlath, king of the Free Hillfolk, carries her away from the fort, and she finds an old magic waking in her blood. Caught between two peoples, she must decide where she belongs.
6
The 5th Wave
Rick Yancey · 2013
Similar plot moves: “Alien Invasion” and “Coming of Age”
- Alien Invasion
- Coming of Age
After a series of waves wipes out most of humanity, sixteen-year-old Cassie is alone and running from an enemy that could look like anyone. To find her little brother she will have to trust a stranger, even as she learns how the invasion really works.
7
The Forever War
Joe Haldeman · 1974
Same genre: “Military science fiction”
- War Fiction
A conscripted soldier fights an interstellar war against the Taurans, an alien enemy he barely understands. Relativity means each tour sends him centuries into the future, where the society he left behind has changed beyond recognition and the war has no clear end.
8
Dune
Frank Herbert · 1965
Shared in the plot: taken, family
- Chosen One
On the desert planet Arrakis, young Paul Atreides survives the destruction of his family and is taken in by the Fremen. As he learns their ways and the spice trade that powers an empire, he becomes the centre of a prophecy, a rebellion and a war for control of the known universe.
9
Childhood's End
Arthur C. Clarke · 1953
Shared in the plot: above, alien
- Alien Invasion
Giant alien ships appear above Earth's cities and impose a peaceful rule under the Overlords. Decades of calm and progress pass, but humanity's golden age hides a purpose no one can guess until the Overlords finally reveal themselves.
10
Master and Commander
Patrick O'Brian · 1969
Similar setting: “War Fiction”
- War Fiction
In 1800, Royal Navy captain Jack Aubrey takes command of a small brig and meets the ship's surgeon, Stephen Maturin, a naturalist and secret intelligence agent. Their friendship grows as the crew pursues a Spanish frigate across the Mediterranean and Atlantic.
11
The Last Kingdom
Bernard Cornwell · 2004
Similar setting: “War Fiction”
- War Fiction
- Coming of Age
Raised by Vikings after they kill his father, the Saxon boy Uhtred must choose between the people who love him and the kingdom of his birth. As Alfred of Wessex battles the Danes, Uhtred becomes a warrior torn between two worlds.
12
Atonement
Ian McEwan · 2001
Similar setting: “War Fiction”
On one summer day in 1935, a girl misreads what she sees and tells a lie that destroys two lives. Years later, as war looms, she tries to understand and atone for what she did. A novel about memory, guilt and the stories we tell to survive.