Book Review: The Maze Runner Series

The Maze Runner Series 9/10
Author: James Dashner
Books in the series: The Maze Runner, The Scorch Trials, The Death Cure as well as the prequel, The Kill Order

Since The Hunger Games, there’s been countless dystopian, young adult novels that have simply failed to reproduce the same intense, kinetic action extravaganza. The Maze Runner, though it still remains insuperior to Suzanne Collins’ masterpiece, is a refreshingly thrilling trilogy.

The Maze Runner – the first in the series – is by far the best of the four. From the first few lines of the first chapter, I was immediately captivated and puzzled as to what the world Thomas had found himself in really was. The characters (of which there are countless, almost on a LOST-type scale) are all established perfectly; it’s easy in young adult books for the characters to become too samey and generic. Here though, Dashner distinguishes between them all well and you really get to understand them all within a few chapters of the book.

What Dashner also does, which is very clever, is know what the reader is thinking. Though the book’s written in the third person, you always follow Thomas’ journey throughout the first book. There are points where you yourself, the reader, believe you’ve cracked it. Where you really believe you know what’s going on. Dashner, brilliantly, seems to then find a way of smashing down your theory at the exact same time. Thomas asks questions that you would ask if you were him, which is incredibly rare in a series such as this. Dashner is always a step ahead of you.

The next two books in the series are not quite as unique as the first. They continue the story on perfectly and the character development continues on. More characters are introduced and even more plot is pumped in. Although, Dashner doesn’t for one moment take away the enormously addictive cliff-hanger chapter endings, which stick with you until the final book.

I’ve never been a huge fan of prequels, but The Kill List serves its purpose well. Yes, it’s completely unnecessary, but it fills that sad void that you’re left with once you’ve finished the trilogy off – it eases you out of the world a little more easily.

In Conclusion: James Dashner has officially done it. The interesting characters and intriguing plot serve as a thrilling and tense read, and it isn’t bogged down by the number of characters or backstory that’s unfolding – definitely a series to read before it hits cinemas this coming November.