Loved the whole Homecoming Series (am currently enjoying book 5, Earthborn) Love all of Orson Scott Card's works, both his sci-fi, as well as his fantasy stuff.

This is a wonderful book. I recently discovered Orson Scott Card and he is a wonderful storyteller. I'm now reading my second series by him. Thank goodness Amazon was able to get the book immediately to me when it was not available at my local store.

I've liked a lot of the science fiction that Card has written but, I now realize that when he writes a multi-volume series like the Ender series or the Alvin Maker series, I tend to lose interest after the first book or two and this series is no exception; I never made it past the middle of book 4 of 5.

I thought his plot did not offer any great surprises and that he telegraphed his punches-- such as they were--long before they landed. I see that Card has written a lot of material concerning various people in the Bible. The strong parallels with various biblical themes found in this series just didn't appeal to me and, frankly, I did not think that his writing was up to the task of successfully incorporating these themes in a way that was powerful enough to justify their use.

Card's portrayal of the nature of the key relationship between the good younger brother, Nafai, and his evil older brother, Elemak, really irritated me and struck me as being very unrealistic. Unrealistic because, although Nafai experiences several instances in which Elemak first plots to kill their father and then tries to kill him, in which Elemak tortures and beats Nefai severely and although Nafai knows--without a doubt--that his older, evil brother is constantly plotting his death, knows of his murderous hatred and rage, knows of his plotting a dictatorial take-over of the expedition to Earth and knows that Elemak's reign would be a catastrophe for the effort to return to Earth, the younger brother meekly accepts it all. Nafai never tries to eliminate this threat to his father and mother, to himself and his wife and child and to the whole purpose of the expedition to Earth. Nefai's incredible restraint in the face of constant plotting, murderous rage and physical abuse by his psychotic brother just strikes me as extremely unrealistic. I assume all turns out well in the end but, I was not interested enough--despite the investment of time it took to read almost 4 of the 5 books in this series--to stick around to find out.

For me, and, I suspect for a lot of other people, five volumes is too much of a slog.

Hmm. I remember reading this series about 10 years ago, and for high school, it was a good read, but nothing outstanding. Now I find that there is absolutely no follow through after the third book, these books are just a thinly disguised re-write of parts of the book of Mormon. For those of us that wanted good SF not a religious treatise, it's downright disappointing. Now I know why Card never resolved the issues concerning the characters. It's because they were just the 'hook' to get us all interested in the Mormon theology. The first three books are just good enough, that when you get to the fourth and the fifth book, you find yourself very annoyed that the characters become flat and lifeless, just caricatures, really. Not to mention, incest starts happening. For example, one of Nafai's brothers and one of his nieces get married and have children . . . Does this happen in Mormonism? because for most of us, getting it on with our uncle is really foul.

Nafai and Elemak never really resolve their differences, or even have a 'final' showdown. The last book carries the reader far into the future and all references to those other characters, like Luet, Hushidh and Issib to name a few, are dropped, never to reappear again.
The series really started going downhill once the Rats and the Bats were introduced. I mean, how lame is this? After 40 million years, the only species to evolve are rats and bats. Not dolphins or the cockroach or - birds even? This is an insult to the reader's intelligence. This becomes the star of the show, with the characters stories taking a back seat and finally disappearing altogether. I read the last few pages of the fourth book hoping to find out what happened after Elemak woke up to find the Nafari gone and his wife with them. After all his cruelties, he never really gets what's coming to him. Nafai turns into exactly what Elemak hates, rather than becoming a full fledged personality of his own. The Prophet Nafai, hm. Ugh.

You find yourself scanning the few moments featuring Shedemei in the fifth novel, to see if she ever even mentions any of them. She doesn't. You have no idea how they died, what happened to the next generation, nothing. Why spend so much time building these characters if they were nothing more than a cheap ploy to get us to read a watered down version of the book of Mormon? I guess Card did this series as opposed to walking around door to door sweating his 'hooy' off trying to sell his religion. This was done in air conditioned comfort I assume, and he fulfills whatever obligation. I just know I will not be picking up any of this author's works without serious thought beforehand. I feel cheated and disgusted.

Earthfall is the continuing story of Nafai and his companions as they travel to Earth aboard Basilica and their trials as they settle. They find that there are two sentient species on Earth - the Angels are bat-like creatures that are almost always born as twins and the Diggers are large, mouse-like rodents that live underground. They have been living in a savage harmony for 40 million years, until humans come back.

The story begins as the group makes ready to leave Harmony on the starship Basilica, a ship that has been preserved for the 40 million years since humans first arrived on Harmony. The group argues over many things, most importantly the sleep schedule of the children, as the deep, cryosleep will cause the body's functions and growth to slow while children that are awake will grow to be near-adults and be able to choose sides, to follow Nafai or follow Elemak.
Once they reach Earth and settle, they discover the Angels and Diggers, which were foretold in dreams in the earlier books in the series. The humans quickly dominate the indigenous species and discover that they've upset the balance and that they must fix the situation.
Meanwhile, the patriarch of the group, Volemak, the former Wetchik, is dying. Because of an oath taken by all in the group that Volemak would be the leader until his death, the settlement, now made up of four generations, must take sides.

New characters are developed in Earthfall, those being the children and grandchildren of the 8 original travelers. Some take after their parents and some do not. Then there is question of genetics - who must marry and who must not? A new Earth is also set here...one that is not the same as when humans were last there.

One thing that has become stagnant in this series is the continuing rivalry of the Nafai camp and the followers of Elemak. It's the same arguments of power all over again for the nth time. There are characters killed off in Earthfall, but it does not change the same rivalry that seems to never be quelled, only fueled.

Earthfall is volume four in the Earthbound series by Orson Scott Card.