The Maze Runner by James Dashner | Website | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram |
Publisher/Year: Delacorte Press | January 1st, 2009
Pages: 374
Series: The Maze Runner Book 1
Genre: Young Adult Dystopian
Format: Hardback
Source: Own
Summary (From Goodreads)
If you ain’t scared, you ain’t human.
When Thomas wakes up in the lift, the only thing he can remember is his name. He’s surrounded by strangers—boys whose memories are also gone.
Nice to meet ya, shank. Welcome to the Glade.
Outside the towering stone walls that surround the Glade is a limitless, ever-changing maze. It’s the only way out—and no one’s ever made it through alive.
Everything is going to change.
Then a girl arrives. The first girl ever. And the message she delivers is terrifying.
Remember. Survive. Run.
Shannan’s Summary
When Thomas opens his eyes, he’s in a box surrounded by strangers with no memory other than his name. And everyone thinks he is the typical monthly addition to the community until the next day when a girl arrives with the promise that everything is about to change.
First Off…
I’ve had this on my TBR list for a while, but bumped it up because I really wanted to see the movie, and I prefer reading the book first.
Thoughts:
This one was hard for me at first because I started reading it before I was really in the mood. But I wanted to read the book before I saw the movie so I forced myself into it. With that said, I was really hooked by the end.
I thought the characters developed well, and the story was strong. Thomas is a great character to follow. As a reader I followed right along with him emotionally. The wave from confused to angry to scared to frustrated to angry again, it was all timed to what the reader was feeling as well. I did like Minho, maybe even a little more than Thomas. I think it was because his character seemed more real. He was terrified of things in the book, but still pushed himself in spite of his fear, whereas Thomas never seemed to be believably afraid of anything.
I did feel a little disconnected at the beginning, not just because I was forcing myself to read the book, but because it felt like there was an information dump, just telling you everything about the world the boys were in. Dashner was smart to make the dump part of the story, so it felt more organic and not like poor writing, but it was still a little akward.
In the end
I enjoyed the book, even though it was frustrating at points . I enjoyed that it wasn’t easy to figure out what was going on or what needed to happen. There were a few small things I did figure out, but most the big things were a surprise to me. I also liked that enough questions were answered to give a satisfactory ending but still enough questions remained that I want to read the rest of the series.
10 Second Summery:
- Prepare to be confused: Almost the first two thirds of the book you’re just as confused as all the characters, sometimes annoyingly so. But it works well for this story.
- Well developed story: Each character is distinct and has their own voice. The action balances everything out. Probably could move a little quicker at the beginning, but it’s mostly a good split between character development and action.
- The end will leave you hanging: You get some closure but not enough. You will want to start reading the next book after this.
Based just on this story, I would say paperback, but the story picked up enough at the end, that I think I’ll like the series better by the end and will be glad to have them all in hardback. If you liked the City of Ember, I would say you’d like this book.