Books: Review
‘The Maze-Runner’ by James Dashner
James Dashner’s YA dystopian novel takes this year’s spotlight after the box office and critical success of its movie adaptation
“It is reminiscent of the The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins because of its similar themes and target audience, but it never failed to shine in this particular subgenre and is completely worth the time. It draws you in unknowingly until the very end.” ★★★★☆ — By Jape Garrido
A dark room arises, surrounded by cold gloom and stale, dusty air. Metal ground against metal. A lurching tremor shook the floor carrying a young lad who awakens with no idea where he is. With no idea who he is. All that he can understand in the remote darkness is a name — My name is Thomas.
The Maze Runner begins with profound confusion in the reader as well as the protagonist, a sixteen year old boy, named Thomas. The obscurity and the rustling of ‘The Box’ combines on to increase the sense of mystery as to where will the book actually begin. When the box stops, Thomas is pulled out of the dark room and into a strange new world where he is greeted with smirks and dirty looks by teenage boys of different ages and sizes. Here he meets Alby, the eldest and the leader of the group; Newt, the next in command; and Chuck, young and chubby boy who was the newest Glader until Thomas arrived. Thomas is the latest addition to the Glade described as a large open green square, surrounded by a gigantic maze. Dashner has created something strange and clever in the striking scenery of the Glade which is ‘The Maze’ to which the community of Gladers revolved in for two years. Every day, a small number of the boys, the Runners, leave the Glade and head out the maze to find a way and Thomas wants to become one of them.
As the new boy, Thomas, grows increasingly frustrated when no one
answers his questions about the Glade, the surrounding maze, and the mechanical creatures called Grievers that roam the maze during nighttime. But soon, Thomas learns that the rest of the boys are just like him. None of them can remember anything prior to the box, nor do they recall why they are in the Glade or who put them there. All they know is that they need to survive, keep their heads down, and hope that the runners will one day find the exit to the complicated, ever-changing maze.
Until the day after Thomas’s arrival, that is. Everything changes. There should not be another delivery from ‘The Box’ for another month – but the following morning, someone else arrives in the Glade. A beautiful teenage girl, named Teresa, bears a disturbing message. Everything is about to change. Somehow, both the new girl and Thomas are connected to the mystery of the Glade and its Maze, and they must do everything they can to find a way out, and to lead the other Gladers to safety.
If you look into it, The Maze Runner is a reflection of the Maze that surrounds the Glade itself. Pieces of the puzzle slowly are shuffled and revealed throughout the book, keeping readers on the edge of their seats. You keep guessing what would happen next, and what each individual piece could mean until the whole picture comes into clarity. Even my soul was filled with pain, anxiety and empathy for the characters. The development and the constant turn of events throughout the book meets the book's ending like perfect puzzle pieces.
The Maze Runner is simply everything that I love in a novel. Futuristic sci-fi/post- apocalyptic/dystopian setting – check. Trapped characters in an impossible setting, fighting for their lives – check. Mass amounts of tension, suspense and violence – check. No cliché Twilight-like love story – check.
My point is, I loved the setting and the idea of this novel. The story is very action- packed and reading the book feels very much like watching a movie because of the spot- on descriptions. It is reminiscent of the The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins because of its similar themes and target audience, but it never failed to shine in this particular subgenre and is completely worth the time. It draws you in unknowingly until the very end. ■ AH Online / The Culture Review
(Editor’s Note: This review was first published in AH Vol. IV, Issue 1 on August 2014)
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