The Maze Runner
by James Dashner
★★★☆
A young boy, Thomas, wakes up in a strange place surrounded by other boys, remembering nothing but his name. He soon finds out he is in the Glade, a place surrounded by a dangerous maze. Every day a few of the boys brave the maze, despite all of the evil beast within it, to try to find a way out. The “runners” main foes are Grievers, part machine, part animal.
The Glade feels vaguely familiar to Thomas though he doesn’t know why. His relationship with the other boys is complicated when a girl shows up claiming everything is about to change.
The book feels like a combination of The Hunger Games and Lord of the Flies, but it falls short of attaining the same impact as either of those books. There are some good characters, Alby, Chuck, Minho, all of whom I liked, but Thomas felt hollow to me. I didn’t dislike him, but I wasn’t attached to him. The book kept my interest, but many parts were predictable and repetitive. I think it’s a good addition to the YA dystopian genre, but certainly not the best.
5 comments:
I liked this one even less than you did; partly that could have been because it's been so hyped on the internets, though.
How funny - when I saw the title, I thought this was something like the Kite Runner - Doh!
Anyway, it doesn't sound like my kind of book.
Jeanne - I succumbed to the hype as well. I've got to stop doing that.
I'd heard about this but I've gotten wary of YA dystopia ... I never like them as much as I think I'm going to. Thanks for the honest review.
Jenners - I'm with you, it seems like YA dystopias are every where. Maybe I've just gotten burned out on them.
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