The Swarm
New York Times bestselling authors Orson Scott Card and Aaron Johnston return with an all-new prequel to Ender's Game, The Second Formic War
The first invasion of Earth was beaten back by a coalition of corporate and international military forces. China has been devastated by the Formic's efforts to eradicate Earth's life forms and prepare the ground for their own settlement. The Scouring of China struck fear into the other nations of the planet; that fear blossomed into drastic action when scientists determined that the single ship that wreaked such damage was merely a scout ship.
There is a mothership out beyond the Solar System's Kuiper Belt, and it's heading into the system, unstoppable by any weapons that Earth can muster.
Card's Ender's Game is one of the bestselling and most beloved science fiction novels of all time. It is set on an Earth where society and governments have been radically altered in the face of alien invasion. Readers will discover the past of Ender's world, feel the desperation of Earth that drove humans to make the changes they did, and meet the heroes who fought off the tide of invasion until Ender could decisively end the wars.
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Orson Scott Card
Before Ender’s Game became required reading in classrooms and a touchstone for science fiction fans worldwide, it was just a short story—one that Orson Scott Card wrote while trying to understand how humanity might survive its own genius. That idea, born of curiosity and a deep interest in moral complexity, would eventually grow into a sprawling series exploring war, empathy, leadership, and the loneliness of brilliance.
Born in Richland, Washington in 1951 and raised mostly in Utah and California, Card grew up in a family where storytelling was a living thing—spoken, passed down, constantly evolving. Though he began his career writing plays and studying literature, he found his true voice in speculative fiction. And when he wrote Ender’s Game—and later Speaker for the Dead—he did something science fiction rarely dared at the time: he treated the genre as a tool for exploring the human soul.
The Second Formic War
The Second Formic War series takes readers deep into the heart of a universe on the brink of annihilation, where humanity's fight for survival against a terrifying alien species—the Formics—reaches a fever pitch. Set within the same universe as Orson Scott Card’s iconic Ender's Game, this thrilling series co-authored with Aaron Johnston expands the stakes in a saga that is as much about the resilience of the human spirit as it is about interstellar warfare.
The Second Formic War consists of two books and series is set to expand with the upcoming release of one more book. The current recommended reading order for the series is provided below.
Main series Enderverse
