© James Pyles

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I finished Orson Scott Card’s novel Wakers last night. Naturally it’s the first book in a trilogy because all books have to be trilogies if not expanded series these days.

Like most people, I was introduced to Card’s writing long ago through Ender’s Game and the subsequent novels in that series. I’m glad to see that Card is still writing and still successful.

In the past twenty years or so, the current gatekeepers of science fiction determined never again to heap any sort of award upon him. This was because he had committed the grievous crime of being religious and making public statements about how his beliefs are guided by such. Between 1978 and 1995, he did win numerous accolades, but the only award post 2000 he’s been granted is the ALA Best Books for Young Adults for “Shadow of the Hegemon.”

Yes, I read “Wakers,” in part, to thumb my nose (like they even know I’m alive) at the exclusionists who run “official” science fiction and fantasy. You know, the folks who claim they want to be “inclusive” and then just shuffle around the players so certain groups are favored at the expense of others, what they say has always been done and they’re still doing it. The only difference is which groups are included and which groups are not. That’s not inclusive, that’s a shell game.

I’m a sucker for an “underdog” (Card’s doing pretty well, but still…) so I checked “Wakers” out of my local public library.

The novel could well be for younger readers. The protagonist is Laz, a seventeen-year-old boy with the ability to “side step,” to shift his consciousness out of one reality into another where he exists. He has done this typically to avoid trouble or to gain advantage, like when he sees he’s not going to do well on a test and then perceives a reality where he gets straight “A”s

Except he’s not the original Laz. He wakes up in what amounts to a high-tech coffin in a room full of high-tech coffins. However, he’s alive and everyone else is dead, as in not fully formed humans. This Laz is a clone and the world he woke up in has been deserted by humanity.

He manages to survive, even semi-taming a pack of feral dogs. He also discovers Ivy (also a teenager), the only other person in the “coffins” who is still alive. It gets interesting after she wakes up and decides she can’t stand Laz, even though he is in love with her.

As it turns out, their being cloned and left to discover how their individual talents (she can see timestreams better than Laz but can’t step into them) are complementary is part of a plan.

After we get the picture of how they learn to survive on a dystopian Earth, they are finally “captured” by adults from another reality. They’re actually from the original Earth, but everyone moved to a new Earth (thanks to the original Laz and Ivy who are a lot older) when a rogue planet threatens to throw our world out of orbit.

However, the New Place isn’t a Safe Place. The rogue planet Shiva is coming there as well. Original Laz has disappeared, and original Ivy can’t find a new and safe planet and move everyone there alone. Only original Laz and original Ivy using their talents together, could open portals to other realities, even ones not only without duplicates of them, but without any human life.

Through a long process clone Laz and clone Ivy manage to do better than the original pair and save humanity by finding a bunch of safe places. But there are mysteries along the way such as where did original Laz side step to, why original Ivy can no longer sense him (or can she?), and why she deliberately chooses planets that aren’t safe but where she’s fascinated by their botany.

The other big mystery is who copied teenage Laz’s and teenage Ivy’s brain patterns for later cloning? The technology wasn’t well-known when Laz was 17 and Ivy (the original was decades younger than original Laz) wasn’t a famous person then, so why go through the expense?

None of those questions are answered, setting everything up for a sequel. At the end of the book (SPOILER ALERT), in one of the safe places, DNA and memory scans are run on Laz and Ivy in case the Earth (Earths) need to open portals to other worlds to avoid another disaster in a thousand years or so.

But what about the mysteries? I suspect the answers lie with disappeared Laz but there was a way for everyone to find out right away.

Original Laz’s and Original Ivy’s parents are still alive. They’re the ones who authorized, and presumably paid for, the brain scans on, and years later, cloning of their original children. No one knows why. The clones both refused to meet them because “they’re not really our parents.” But why not meet them and ask “why did you have us brain scanned and cloned?”

I don’t know if Card missed this or it factors into the sequels. I guess I’ll find out one day. That, more than anything, caused the ending to fizzle. Also, original Ivy, who was developing into a royal pain, just “went away” at the end of the book rather than complain about cloned Laz and Ivy keeping secrets and upstaging her. Like I said, fizzle.

All that said, it’s a good book, excellent writing, and a compelling mystery. I found Laz and Ivy annoying much of the time, but that’s how they were written. It was confusing to find that sometimes Ivy seemed to hate Laz and then she’d turn around and lavish him with kisses. I know she was insecure about her attractiveness (so was Laz), but really.

I’m glad Card is still writing. He’s still “got it.”