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1. His age (almost fifty) has affected his resilience and stamina. This tour, when he's been afflicted with a cold, showed him how quickly he can break down and how slowly he recovers. His publishing company has been gracious and generous in providing him with the best accommodations and have helped him at every turn, but what they can't do is make him young again.

2. Recent events have made it very difficult for him to be away from his family. The years that parents have with their children are precious, and to spend two solid weeks in which he is not there when his six-year-old comes home from school is even more frustrating now than it has been in the past. Plenty of other people have to make such sacrifices in order to earn a living, but OSC doesn't actually have to, and so he won't.

3. While on such a trip, and for the weeks just before and about a week after, he can't write anything substantial. Presumably, if given a choice, everyone would rather have more books than more autographing sessions.

Says Card: "I enjoy the actual signings, the chance to meet those who read my books and hear what they care about and look for in the work I do. It's the surrounding problems, like jet lag, lost sleep, lack of real exercise, and being away from home, that are taking too high a toll.

"I will still do individual signings when I visit a city with enough advance notice to arrange one with a local bookstore. Please don't think that this is the last chance to talk with me or get a book autographed. It's the multi-city tour that I will no longer do. So DON'T imagine that you have to come see me on this tour - there'll be plenty of other chances.

"In fact, we at Hatrack River are working on a plan to begin a series of conventions, perhaps every three years, centered around one or another of my works - conventions that will be held in the summer, and to which I can bring my family so we're NOT apart. We hope that the first will be EnderCon I in the summer of 2002, to coincide with the 25th anniversary of the publication of the novelet "Ender's Game" in Analog's August 1977 issue."