Reading Between the lines with PJC:

I first met the main character Bean of Shadows in Flight many years ago in school when I discovered the novel Ender's Game. Since that time, I have read and reread the novels of Orson Scott Card.

I was not disappointed when I picked up Shadows in Flight, though I never expected to be.

Card's Shadow series, a set of sequels of his original science fiction novel Ender's Game, thrills readers with its technological prowess and moving love story. Shadows in Flight is the penultimate book in the series and continues

the story of power, emotion and fear. Set over 400 years into the future, Bean and his children are living on a spacecraft traveling near the speed of light. Their mission is to discover a cure for a disease that makes them literal geniuses but forces their physical bodies to continue to grow throughout their entire lives. With these prospects they are doomed to live only into their early 20's and then die due to the great physical stress produced by the disease. Readers will marvel at how Card brings the conflict to a resounding resolution. Despite the short length — a mere 240 pages — Card manages to fit all that is necessary into the story, as well as develop characters with real voices of their own. My one criticism of Card's writing is that I simply feel hungry for more. I do not want to be able to read the story in just one day. I think Card would also do well to give more detail in his writing. Though I think that

sometimes authors overdo the descriptions of physical features or dimensions, Card does not.

By increasing the amount of description, Card could entice

his readers even more to fall in love with the characters and their trying lives. One more novel in the Shadow series remains to be written. The release date for Shadows Alive has not been set but claims to wrap up the Shadow series

and the Ender series. Shadows Alive will will tie up many loose ends in both series.