Where The Path Has Led Me

Justin Loc

Pathfinder
By Orson Scott Card

Rigg holds a dangerous destiny, a destiny that both his birthright and powerful ability has set for him. The teenager possesses an impressive mind and body, as well as a secret power to see the "paths" once taken by the movement of living beings throughout history, from a minute ago to a thousand years ago. This supposedly unique power is used by Rigg to help with his job to trap animals in the forest. But, as the boy's supposed father dies, he learns of the existence of his mother and sister. This incident begins the teenager's journey, where he will meet new people, either friend or enemy, as he sets off to search for his unknown family. Along the way, Rigg must learn more of his power and its limit, and more about the world's secrets. Rigg's teachings from his father will help with this, but knowing everything from who to trust to who he really is will take time and effort, even for the ingenious boy.

Now that I have read up to half of the book (I only based my last blog about Pathfinder on the first few chapters), I have made a more conclusive opinion on Card's writing style and the story itself. Previously, I stated that the scenes and actions were detailed in the narration. This is still true throughout the first half of Pathfinder, and I don't doubt that it stays like this throughout the second. But, what I have found more moving to me is how the narrator explains their thoughts to the reader periodically: "'We are poor privicks,' muttered Umbo. Loaf ignored him. But Rigg thought about it. Umbo is a poor privick, though[...]his father did well as anyone else, and his family was never hungry," (150). With this, it helps the reader get a good understanding of what the character is thinking about. This style of writing is great for the character development of the main characters, while the minor characters' character development is done through the dialogue and actions, like I stated before. Next, in my previous blog, I stated that mystery was a theme in this novel, although it was science-fiction. I still agree with this, as many questions have not been answered yet. I feel that the book is long compared to an average story, but by no means think it's boring. I have not felt the slightest sense of annoyance or boredom reading the past 300 pages. The element of wanting to know more leads to wanting to read more. I call this an appetite for reading, and finishing the book is my meal.


Rigg's character won over my personal support of the book when I started it, as I stated in my previous blog. That has not changed, but I also have been won over by the beginning of the chapters. I'm intrigued by the second story being told besides Rigg's, which is Ram Odin's. The language used by the two characters in Ram's story is completely different from Rigg's: "'Each computer was an observer and a meddler in spacetime at the time the fold was created,' said Ram. 'You and I weren't observers, because we could not sense or even understand the convolutions of the fields being generated.'" (245-246). I find this separate story genuinely interesting, as it is strange compared to other writings. Most of it is dialogue, and the vocabulary is, in my opinion, scientific. And the story itself is something I have tried to think about before: traveling through spacetime. Not only do I get to enjoy reading this book, but I get from it new ideas for pondering about in the future.

I think it is obvious that I support others to read this book, especially since I have said only good things about it and that it won me over earlier. I recommend this book to those interested in either science-fiction or fantasy, as it feels like both. But, since it also has an interesting and long plot, I think that any teenager that enjoys reading would enjoy reading Pathfinder in their free-time.