[chc]

I agree that Card's writing is not what it used to be, but I don't think he's crassly cashing in on his past success. I think he has simply lost his touch (or at least, he no longer has the touch that appealed to us).

His early works were written when he was still relatively young and passionate and had years' worth of crazy ideas swirling around in his head. Fast forward 25 years, he's written all the good ideas he originally had, and he's now a middle-aged Mormon father and conservative political activist. If you read his books nowadays, you'll find they're pretty much what you'd expect from that description.