This month's review is a book which has been recommended to me by a lot of people. I've had these books on my shelf for months but it wasn't until a few weeks ago when I actually decided to pick it up and read.
Enjoy!
Title:
The Maze Runner (Book One)
Author:
James Dashner
Genre:
Young Adult Fiction/Sci-Fi/ Post-Apocalyptic Fiction
Description:
When he wakes in complete darkness, with no memory of anything but his name, Thomas is surrounded with fear and confusion. The metal box he is in takes him to a place called the Glade, where a group of other boys have formed a small community. Gradually, he builds the knowledge that, just like him, all of the other boys had arrived in the same way, with no idea who they were. Every month, the elevator box arrives to the surface of the Glade, providing the 'Gladers' with another boy.
What is even stranger than the tribe of amnesiac boys is the fact that the Glade is, in fact, at the centre of a huge maze. But this is no ordinary maze - because, every night, the four entrances close and the walls move. It is up to the eight Runners to spend each day running through the maze, searching for any clues to a way out of their "home". For reasons which he cannot possibly understand, Thomas desires to become one of these runners; he wants to find a way out of this confusing life. Even when he discovers that brutal, monstrous creatures prowl the depths of the maze, he can't imagine doing anything but Running.
But it's only a day after Thomas' arrival when everything gets even weirder. For the first time ever, a girl arrives in the Glade, claiming that everything's about to change and that she's "the last one", and then passing out into a coma. This event is only the beginning of mysterious events in the Glade. Can the Gladers escape before everything gets even worse?
My Thoughts and Opinions:
Overall, this was a really good book. It was well written and the descriptions had a lot of depth.
The only flaw I can really think of is the beginning. Personally, I found that it had quite a slow start and I really struggled to keep reading. I'm really fussy when it comes to books - if it doesn't reel me in and appeal to me in the first few chapters, I tend to get impatient and put the book down. I'm not going to lie, there was a couple of times when I almost did that. However, a small part of me wanted to keep going because I had a feeling that it was going to get moving eventually and I'd enjoy reading it. Luckily, I was right. The first ten (or so) chapters took me about a week to read. But, after that, I read the rest of the book in a day. There's a particular part in the book which, for me, was a real turning point. Though, I'm not going to say what happened because that would probably spoil it for anybody who wants to read it themselves.
Moving on, however, there were many good aspects from the middle of the story onwards. I'm not going to say too much about the characters because I feel like that's all I ever talk about in reviews but I think that Dashner portrayed them pretty well. To be honest, there were only about four or five characters which I actually liked but that was probably the most realistic part. I guess when you've been trapped in a Maze for a year or two with loads of creepy monsters, you may go a little psychotic.
Whilst there was definitely a lot of seriousness and action, there is also the occasional hint of humour, which is something I often look for in a book.
