Friday, October 17, 2014

REVIEW: The Maze Runner by James Dashner


Title: The Maze Runner
Author: James Dashner
My Rating: 3.5 Stars

"WICKED is good" 

Synopsis (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.

Review (Spoiler free): 

Starting this book was a very difficult task for me. This book didn't get overly interesting for me until about half way through, so almost 200 pages in. I had heard a lot of good things about this book, but also bad. So obviously I wanted to find out for myself. 
Within the first chapter I had already started to find Thomas, the character, very annoying. He would always ask questions when the answer was obvious, go places he wasn't supposed to go as if the rules didn't apply to him, and then get angry when he was denied the knowledge he wanted to know. Knowledge, I might add, that everybody else didn't get to know when they had been there a long time. Now of course I understand his want to know stuff, especially from coming out of a Box with no memories, but there gets to be certain line where it goes from curious to just annoying. 
Thomas always seemed to change his mind in everything too. He would go from not liking somebody to wanting them to leave him alone. The one guy that tried to be his friend was shut out at times! 
But anyway, before I start to accidentally write about spoilers, I will say other things about the book.
Overall, I thought the book was pretty good! I gave the book 4 stars on Goodreads because it was between 3 and 4, and also I didn't have the heart to give it 3 stars. But on here, I'm giving it 3.5 stars out of 5. My favorite characters were without a doubt Minho and Teresa. And I think my reasoning behind is that they told it like it was. When Thomas was being annoying, Minho and Teresa set him straight, but also in a way to make him feel better :) *Cough* Especially after what Chuck did *Cough* 
Now I would recommend this book if you can plow through a bunch of question asking in the beginning and/or if you like confusing realms.  

Spoiler Discussions!!! (WARNING: Will contain spoilers, so only if you have READ THE BOOK!):

Okie dokie. Firstly, stuff in the maze. How did you imagine the Grievers? With the way James Dashner described them, it was very hard for me to imagine anything with flesh and metal on it's body. I imagined a gigantic slug with claws, pincers, etc. sticking out of it's body for the majority of the book. It was hard to incorporate flesh into all of that machinery. 
Secondly, the characters! Like I said, Thomas was annoying and my favorites were Teresa and Minho. But my least favorite character was easily Gally. Oh Gally... the person that yelled at them all, threatened Thomas and  jumped into a living Griever. It was crazy to see him at the end of the book, the Creators controlling the things he was doing. And by that, I men Chuck. :( Poor Chuck. I felt really bad for him. Practically the only Glader that we read about wondering about parents ad the like. I wasn't expecting the knife being hurled at Thomas, and I surely wasn't expecting Chuck to throw himself in front of Thomas. Chuck didn't even get to finish his sentence! We'll never know what he was going to say! Now a part of the annoying-ness I groaned abut in Thomas had to have been when he was distraught over Chuck. Don't get me wrong, I was melancholy that he was gone, but Thomas kept on beating up himself for the promise he broke to Chuck: the promise that he will bring Chuck back to his parents. This is where I loved Teresa. When Thomas was going through this, Teresa was the one to tell him to stop. That it wasn't his fault. And she's right, it wasn't.  
Thirdly, the Creators and how the Gladers got out of the Maze. It is incredibly weird to think that scientists went through so much trouble ti find out which kids were smart enough to help them. The maze is many miles long. That is a ginormous maze to build!! Not to mention there has to be some type of protective covering overheadfor the sky. It just now reminds me of the arena in Hunger Games... The description of the outside world, with all of the hideous people because of The Flare, was disconcerting. It was a strange comparison too. Because I imagined the Glade for more than 300 pages, with it's giant walls and strong ivy, it was weird to think of the Gladers in a different environment. There was a short description of what happened to the outside world, but it was a little confusing. That will probably become more clear in the other books. 
Lastly! The Epilogue!! Yes, that's right. The Epilogue has it's own paragraph. Why? Because it implies a lot of bombshells and jaw droppers. And also because I love how this epilogue was done. It was discrete and the twists were not directly said. My personal favorite to introduce stuff.
"Oddly enough, seeing them this way, thinking all is well, has been the hardest thing for me to observe." So this clearly means that the people that rescued Thomas and the others were planned. THEY ARE NOT FRIENDLIES! They all feel safe, but it's FAKE! 
"The subjects will be allowed one full night's sleep before Stage 2 implements." This is probably the second book right? The Scorch Trials? 
And lastly, the biggest shocker: "Group B's trial results were also most extraordinary." THERE IS A SECOND GROUP!? That means there is a second group that was in a maze... the same way as Thomas' group! Are the Creators crazy!? *sigh* The Epilogue alone makes me want to read the second book, but I'm probably going to have to wait. 
In the meantime, tell me what you thought of the book! Who was your favorite character? Least favorite? Did you love this book? Did you hate it? 

Write you later,
         Akiko

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