As an avid YA reader, I’ve read nearly all of the well-known YA series: Percy Jackson, Harry Potter, The Hunger Games, Divergent, Eragon, and many others. Until a month ago, however, I had never read James Dashner’s The Maze Runner series. I knew the premise, and I had seen the first two movies, but I had never picked up one of the books. When I was looking for new books to read recently, I knew it was finally time to read it.
The Maze Runner series is a fantastic saga full of friendship, morality, and twists and turns that keep you hooked until the very end. For those of you that don’t already know, it begins as such: an amnesiac boy named Thomas arrives in the center of an enormous maze where dozens of other boys like him have been trying to find a way out of the labyrinth for years. He joins the efforts just as complications arise that add to the urgency of their escape. Thomas pushes against the status quo that these boys have created in the hopes that they will finally succeed.
I am so glad I finally finished the series. The secrets and revelations kept me turning the pages all night to find out how everything fit together. It is such a rich story with so much to consider that I had no trouble finding things I liked about it that contributed to my desire to keep reading. I latched onto Thomas, and I needed to find out how his story ended.
I’ll be honest; The Maze Runner series takes place in a confusing world. What works well about the series is that we, the readers, discover and understand things simultaneously with Thomas. As long as you are willing to sit with your confusion and accept that everything will become clear eventually, you should have no trouble enjoying The Maze Runner.