Traitorfish
The Tighnahulish Kid
That's very nearly what happened, as a matter of fact- the book was supposed to be a prequel tie-in thing to a video game called "Shadow Complex", it's just that the game was heavily delayed, released directly to Xbox Live Arcade and then sank without a trace, so all anyone remembers is that inexplicably awful novel.Empire by Orson Scott Card
It's about an American civil war. Liberals vs Conservatives. All those caricatures of "liberals" and "conservatives" you see in the media were brought to life by Mr. Card, who did an amazing job of taking the most extreme and ridiculous portrayals of members of both camps and for some reason made them into actual characters in his story. So as a result you have these .. strawmen walking around, talking to each other. And you're expected to take this all at face value.
It's not supposed to be a funny book, it's supposed to be serious. So right off the bat, as you're reading this thing, you think to yourself "Something isn't right here"
It gets worse and worse the more you read. I won't include any spoilers in case anyone actually wants to read this drivel, but honestly, don't bother. Card is usually a very good author. The only explanation I have is that somebody paid him big bucks and said "here's my book outline, here are the characters I've invented, here is the plot, make all this into a novel and I will give you a load of cash"
(Apparently the game itself was actually pretty good, and sold well for an Arcade release, it's just that they aren't the sort of games that tend to have a lot of cultural staying power.)
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