The Maze Runner: A truthful review

The Maze Runner was a book I always intended on reading, but never found the time to read. I have a huge interest in the dystopian genre and this had been on my reading list for a long time. Perhaps, I read it a little too late. I found it very predicable and this may had taken away it’s magic.

Synopsis

Sixteen-year-old Thomas wakes up in a place called the Glade, where towering walls close at night to keep a colony of boys safe from the monsters outside them. They have all had their memories erased, but Thomas remembers just a little too much. The world is in catastrophe and they are living in the Killzone, mere animals in a bizarre experiment. Soon Teresa, the first girl, arrives and tells them the game is on. Some boys think they are better off in this cold, cruel place than going back to where they came from — they have formed a society after all, with rules and jobs like farming and even butchering their own meat. But Thomas turns out to be the leader they’ve needed to form their own army, revolt against the monsters, and take on the people who have set them up in this very cruel and isolated world. Of course the outside world may have its own scary challenges.¹

Review

Where to start with The Maze Runner? Perhaps with characterisation. No, I’ll start with the positive. I did enjoy how easy the book read. The chronological order was easy to follow and allowed the reader to fully engage with the day to day tasks of the boys. It was always clear what was happening, and the writing was smooth. It was clear that there was life before Thomas arrived which the writer weaved in through discussions on rules and the history of the runners in the maze.

As mentioned, I found the lack of personality and character development took away from the story. Although, yes, Thomas changes slightly as he starts to remember things from his past, there is very little development and growth. Everything felt static and almost boring.

I had read someone compare this to another version if Lord of the Flies, and I do not agree. If anything, we could say it is likely to be better compared to The Coral Island as the boys worked quite well together to create a functional society in The Glaze. Everything seems almost perfect on The Glaze. They had distributed chores and jobs so easily and keep with the rules so strictly to maintain order. It seems almost odd, and yet the only answer I can suppose for this is that they were carefully chosen for their intellect.

I will finalise here, as I should read the rest of the series, but this first book was not exactly gripping. The ending was a nice set up considering I read the epilogue, too, which pushes the story along to phase two.

1. https://www.commonsensemedia.org/book-reviews/the-maze-runner-maze-runner-trilogy-book-1 ↩︎