It's all very interesting, and yet it makes me wonder: is there some truth in all these writings? Are we really just a few years away from the apocalypse? Will we be forced to colonize on the moon? Or Mars?
You know what? I'm going to write about a positive future one of these days. A Utopian book, instead of the heart racing dystopias that have everyone ripping through books page by page. Though, to be fair, that wouldn't be near as exciting, would it? I guess it's like the question that I was asked on my new OKCupid account--would you rather good or interesting things happen? The literary, story telling, fiction crazed genius inside me says INTERESTING! And yet when I finish the fifth, sixth, seventh... book about the inevitable fall of the human race, I feel I need a little bit of good. A little bit of happiness.
So maybe I'll just reread some Judy Blume or Beverly Cleary. Or, more likely, Harry Potter.
Anyways, onto describing these apocalyptic masterpieces and why there are worth a read. Starting, of course, with the most recent series I've gotten myself into: The Maze Runner by James Dashner.
Just a little note before I begin--I have only read the first two, so I am still in the dark about a lot. That said, one of the things that makes this series so incredibly brilliant is the simple fact that there are so many unknowns. It starts with our main character, Thomas, waking up in a black box with very few memories. He can remember what a tree is, but can't see a specific tree in his mind. He knows his name, but nothing else about himself. Essentially, he knows just about as much as the reader. Which is nothing.
The first half of the book is spent getting to know the various characters in the "Glade," the community of about thirty boys that welcomes him when the box finally reaches the surface. Surrounding the area of the actually-functional Lord of the Flies society are huge walls that move every day to reveal a different maze. There are a few "Runners" (hence, Maze Runner, get it?) who run the maze during the day when the doors are open in order to find a way out.
Spoiler: there isn't one.
Shocked? Me neither.
The doors to the maze shut at night, of course, as there are horrible creatures called Grievers that seem to be blobs with spikes coming out of them and are just the worst creatures the boys have ever seen, though are a fairly rudimentary villain. I mean, blobs with spikes? Not the best.
Then, to top off this crazy story, there is only one other person added to the mix: a girl. (Which, admittedly, is the point when we are all grateful this is a functional society and not one created by William Golding.) Then everything falls apart and they have to figure out a way to get out of the Glade.
Okay. There you have it. A rough sketch of the story. Now. Onto things Dashner did well.
Making his main character, who is clearly more influencial than he thinks, have about as much information as the reader. This way, we are able to discover things along with him, instead of discovering things as the narrative voice decides to give them up. (This is one of the big problems I have with Dan Brown, who often writes as if the readers know exactly what he's talking about. A lot of his work can only be understood on the second read, which, while making the second time you read it very illuminating, is extremely frustrating after two hundred pages. Especially when you know for damn sure that the good guys aren't the good guys because they never are. Oy.)
Thomas is a very believable character who you want to win for the entire first two books. Note: I have now finished the last one, so I will have actual insights to share with you. Maybe stop reading if you want to read them. But Thomas is a good character who forms believable relationships with everyone around him. He even adopts the language of the Glade at an appropriate pace--he doesn't jump right in a start talking like a "Glader," he gets made fun of a little first.
Another thing Dashner did well was his way around swear words. Obviously, kids--and teenagers especially--are going to swear. But either the mind swipe took away their memories of swear words or they just wanted to create their own for fun. Essentially, they have their own version of cursing that makes the dialogue much more believable. Swear words are rough, but they add legitimacy to a story when used properly. And they're good--klunk instead of shit, skint instead of asshole, and shuck instead of you know what.
Thomas was a fantastic protagonist who drove the narrative the whole time. This should be a given, but after reading the second two Hunger Games, I am grateful. He wasn't necessarily the "leader," but he found a way to make most of the decisions that propelled the plot.
Okay, now on to the things I have issues with:
After three books, I'm still not entirely sure what the whole point was. Their brains were being studied to figure out how they were immune--that I get--but why did they have to go through all of that? It was never clear why they were put into such horrible situations. Why they couldn't just scan the brain. What specifically did the study do for WICKED? We never learned really how they benefited from their studies, how the kids' reactions were to create a cure. And, now that I'm thinking on it, why did Thomas and Teresa need to learn how to speak telepathically? That was never made clear. These things bug me not only because I don't know the answers, but because I'm not sure Dashner does either. If he did, that should have been communicated to me, and it wasn't. The whole study seemed fairly pointless. To be fair, the fact that the study was pointless and ineffective was pretty much the thesis of the third book, but I never knew why they thought it would work in the first place.
On that note, all the kids were given the opportunity to have their memories returned to them. Thomas, whose mind we are in, refuses. Now, this makes sense when you consider that the offer comes from the very people messing with their minds in the first place. This makes no sense when you consider the second time, when they could have been removed by a man on their side. A) it's cowardly, which isn't in his character, and B) it keeps the readers in the dark about things we definitely needed to know. We needed to know why he was helping WICKED in the first place. A little more flashback would have been nice, so we could have understood his previous self's motivation a bit better.
Granted, there are a few prequels to the books, so maybe those hold the answers I'm looking for. Though to be fair, I expect a little more when I'm done with a series.
But the story kept me turning the pages, and I especially enjoyed Thomas' choice at the end--though I also do not so much approve of how Dashner introduces Chancellor Paige and then the only way we meet her is through a very convenient and mysterious rescue and a penned letter. But again, maybe that is revealed in the prequels.
On a scale of one to ten (with one being twilight and ten being Harry Potter), I give the series a seven. There were a few elements missing, but the characters were believable and the story was captivating. The more books I read, though, the more I'm hoping the movies will be better.
But, alas, they very rarely are. My fingers are crossed for the next Hunger Games movie.
One of my students who was struggling to match sounds with letters read an ENTIRE BOOK today. And then he ran into a wall. Ah, I love my job.
Read on,
LPRO
