Close Reading and Symbolism Analysis of The Book Maze Runner

The book The Maze Runner by James Dashner is an exquisite book that includes a lot of action along with complex secrets that even I as a reader don’t know myself. My experience of this book is hard to describe, as there were moments where I was thrilled by the action and held by suspense, while there were other times where I would sit there and think, as if I’m in Thomas’s shoes trying to solve the maze. These are some of my opinions and thoughts on this tremendous novel.

Before I even found out this book was assigned to read for the summer, I had already had it picked out and was going to read it anyways. The reason I chose this book is because it is a dystopian fiction. I find dystopian literature to be the most interesting, as it gives an idea of what the world could turn into if things don’t get straighten out. I also love a lot of other dystopian books similar to The Maze Runner like the books The Hunger Games and The Giver.

The main character, Thomas, had a lot of traits that supported him and also the gladers. One reason the gladers were able to escape the Glade was because Thomas was extremely attentive. Thomas had paid close attention to where the grievers would enter and exit through, allowing him to find the exit of the maze. Thomas is rather intelligent as well. He came up with the idea that there must be a code in the map, which he had used as a passcode to defeat the maze. One more important trait is that Thomas is brave. It must have taken a lot of guts for Thomas to have stepped outside the maze even though his life was strongly at risk. Thomas was willing to risk his life just for the miniscule chance of saving Newt and Minho. Fortunately, all three were able to come back alive, and Thomas’s noble act had paid off.

Although the majority of this book was easy to understand with the descriptive writing, I still wonder why certain events even occurred. First of all, I don’t understand why Thomas and Teresa are telepathic. Why would they be given telepathy if they can just talk face to face? And why would the people from W.I.C.K.E.D. try to kill Thomas. Why not any of the rest of them. Also, why was Gally working for W.I.C.K.E.D? Is Gally really a good guy like he said or a bad guy? And last of all, what is W.I.C.K.E.D. and what are their intentions? I believe these questions will be answered as the series continues, for these events may be foreshadowing what will occur in future books.

There were many ups and downs to this novel. In the beginning of the book, I was not enjoying it because the hook wasn’t interesting enough and I was really confused about what was going on. However my interest suddenly peaked once Thomas was trapped outside the maze. This added so much danger that left me on the edge of my seat. All the events following this scene added to more and more conflict, and my brain was about to explode with excitement by the time I got to the climax. If I were to rate this book, I’d give it 4.5 stars out of 5. Reading this book was a truly thrilling experience and I plan to read all of the sequels. If I don’t I may not be able to keep myself sitting still, thinking about what will end up happening to Thomas and the gladers.