Book:First Meetings

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Edition:	Tor Teen (Mass Market Paperback)
Author:
Published:	September 2004
Pages:	224
ISBN 10:	0765347989
New:	$3.08 (40)
Used:	$1.40 (41)


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First Meetings (2002) is a collection of Orson Scott Card's short stories from the Ender's Game series. The 2003 edition published by Tor Books (which has been retitled First Meetings in the Enderverse and First Meetings in Ender's Universe) also includes the story "Teacher's Pest", about the first meeting of Ender's parents.

1 Story list
2 References

Story list

The stories in this book are:

"The Polish Boy" (2002)
"Teacher's Pest" (2003)
"Ender's Game" (1977)
"Investment Counselor" (1999)

The Polish Boy

"The Polish Boy" tells the story of how John Paul Wieczorek (Ender’s father) as a small child gets tested by the International Fleet and convinces them to get his family out of Poland.

Plot summary

John Paul is a very smart child who is being home schooled because his family refused to comply with the populations control laws. One day Captain Helena Rudolf from the International Fleet shows up to test three of John Paul’s brothers for possible admission into Battle School. While there she notices John Paul reading a book and decides to test him early. He passes the test and gets a very high score for leadership. The IF tries to get him to go to Battle School but John Paul is only interested in trying to get his family out of Poland so that they can have a better life and he can get a good education. Captain Graff realizes this but agrees to send the Wieczorek family to America because he hopes that one of John Paul’s children will go to Battle School.

This story contains younger versions of important characters in the Enderverse, such as Hyrum Graff and Admiral Chamrajnagar. Other characters associated with the IF appear, including Captain Helena Rudolf and Colonel Sillian.

Teacher's Pest

"Teacher’s Pest" tells the story of how John Paul Wiggin (Ender's father) meets and falls in love with his future wife.

Plot summary

While going to college John Paul is assigned to take a Human Communities class being taught by a graduate student named Theresa Brown. At first he isn't happy about this but when he goes to class and discovers that she is very smart and may actually be smarter than he is, he falls in love with her. In an effort to make her fall in love with him he goes to her office to talk with her. Unfortunately she had just been told that her research project was being taken away from her in an effort to get her father Admiral Brown to come out of retirement. As a result she didn't want to talk to anyone. Determined, John Paul waits outside her office and orders food for her while she talks to her father on the phone. When she finally comes out he is still waiting for her. She decides to eat with him and while they talk John Paul tells her about his secret past. As they continue to talk they both begin to fall in love.

Ender's Game

"Ender's Game" (short story) is the story of how Ender Wiggin as a little boy defeated the Formics in an interstellar war. It first appeared in the August 1977 issue of Analog magazine and was later expanded into the full length novel Ender's Game.

Plot Summary

This story begins shortly after Ender is made the commander of Dragon Army at a Battle School designed to make young boys into military commanders to fight in the next war against the Formics. Right away Ender takes his army to the Battle Room and begins practicing and training them to fight the other armies. Due to his genius in leadership Dragon Army goes on to win nineteen battles in fifteen days. At the end of the nineteenth battle Ender is told that his Army is being broken up and his toon leaders are being made into commanders. As soon as this is done Ender is sent to Command School where he begins studying with new teachers including Mazer Rackham. They teach Ender how to use a battle simulator and tell him that he will be using it to fight mock battles. Before his first battle begins Ender discovers that many of the boys from Battle School are also at Command School and that they will be his toon leaders. With the help of his toon leaders Ender wins every battle and in the end destroys the enemy’s home world. Once the last battle is over Mazer tells an exhausted Ender that the battles were real and that he saved the human race.

Investment Counselor

"Investment Counselor" tells the story of how Ender Wiggin first met the artificial intelligence Jane and became a speaker for the dead. It first appeared in the anthology Far Horizons edited by Robert Silverberg and then later in Card's short story collection First Meetings.

Plot Summary

Andrew Wiggin had just turned twenty when he arrived at the planet Sorreledolce which meant that he would have to file a tax return on the trust fund given to him by the International Fleet at the end of the Bugger war. When he showed his list of investments to the tax collector the man immediately started thinking about how he was going to steal some of it. Later on while Andrew was trying to figure out his taxes he received an email offering him financial software. When he opened it a woman's head calling itself Jane appears on his computer screen and offered to help him with his finances. A couple of days later Andrew's sister Valentine took him to a speaking. While there he talked to the speaker for the dead and found out how he got started. Later Andrew decided to use the Jane program. When he went to the tax office with the forms Jane had created for him, the tax collector he met on the first day tried to blackmail him. However when he tried to call up the proof that Andrew was Ender the Xenocide on his computer he found that the files had mysteriously disappeared. When he tried do research on Andrew he found that all the public data on him was no longer available. After doing his first speaking for the tax collector Andrew and his sister left Sorelledolce.