People think that what I do is I write novels about children.

No, I don't.

I write novels about humans, but humans begin as children.

And my model was, I want to write novels as if they were biographies.

Ender's Game is one of the biggest science fiction stories of all time.

It won the Hugo and Nebula Awards.

Those are two of the most prestigious sci-fi literature awards.

It spawned a giant franchise of books, 19 of them, soon to be 20, as well as graphic novels, even a Hollywood blockbuster. To this day, it's still read and cherished by millions of readers 35 years after its release. This week, we're going to change gears with a different kind of guest. As many of you know, I'm a huge sci-fi fan and a bookworm, so we're talking with Orson Scott Card, one of the biggest names in the genre. The Ender's Game story starts with humanity's attempt to prevent the next great war with foreign invaders by having government agencies breed child geniuses and then train them as the ultimate soldiers. Aside from the foreign invaders being aliens, this future doesn't seem all that improbable. Scott's work is often set where he can imagine the technology and politics of the future.

These days, sci-fi has been invaded by radical left ideology,

writers focusing on social justice street credit rather than stories about the human condition.

But Scott continues to challenge his readers and himself with a massive body of work,

telling stories not just of sci-fi, but magic, fantasy, even religious fiction, and Shakespeare adaptations.

In our conversation, we discuss why many sci-fi writers are entering new genres,

what drove Scott's write an entire novel as a narrative response to Stephen King's Pet Cemetery,

why The Force is the worst part of Star Wars, and attacks from critics

on the themes of Enders game.

I'm excited to welcome Orson Scott Card to today's Sunday special.

If you want to hear the bonus material behind the paywall, you need to go over to dailywire.com slash subscribe and become a member. There's going to be all sorts of good stuff over there. Go check it out right now. Orson Scott Card. Welcome to the Ben Shapiro Show Sunday special. Oh, it's my pleasure. So why don't we start with the sci-fi genre itself? So most of the books that you've written are in the sci-fi genre.

Why do you choose to write in that genre so much? Oh, do you want the short version or the long version? The real reason I started writing sci-fi was that back when I was starting to try to

write, to make money, to try to pay off the debts of the theater company I had started because I was a theater

guy. I thought the only thing I could write that might make money would be science fiction

because if I tried to sell mainstream fiction to The New Yorker or women's fiction to Red

...