Title: The Scorch Trials
(The Maze Runner #2)
Author: James Dashner
Genre: YA, Science Fiction, Dystopia
First published: October 12th 2010
Finished reading: July 26th 2015
Pages: 361
““Shuck it,” Minho responded. “I’m tougher than nails. I could still kick your pony-lovin’ butt with twice this pain.”
Thomas shrugged. “I do love ponies. Wish I could eat one right now.””
I’ve read The Maze Runner a little over a year ago and wasn’t really impressed. The ‘slang’ really bothered me while I was reading it and I couldn’t connect to the characters. But since I already own a copy of both sequels and really want to start finishing some series, I decided to pick up my copy of The Scorch Trials anyway. I guess I ended up liking it slightly better than the first book, although the slang still annoyed me a lot. I just don’t see the point of all the shuck and shank every two sentences… The interactions between the Gladers (and the Cranks) weren’t always believable, but I did feel the plot was slighly more interesting. James Dashner writes his books with a fast pace, so it’s quite a quick read as well. And although it’s still not the greatest dystopian novel I’ve ever read, The Scorch Trials is entertaining enough if you can get over the slang and lack of character development.
WARNING: do not read this summary if you haven’t read The Maze Runner yet! It will most likely contain spoilers, even though I’ve made sure to keep it short.
Thomas and the other Gladers were able to escape the Maze, but that doesn’t necessarily mean freedom. WICKED isn’t done with them yet, and now they have to get ready to face Phase Two. They will have to cross The Scorch to find safety. There are no rules and nobody will help them; they are on their own. If they don’t make it on time, they will die. But they are not the only group fighting for their survival, and things are about to get messy. Will they be able to overcome the challenges and find their way to safety?
The Scorch Trials was a little better than The Maze Runner, but I still wasn’t overly impressed by it. It is entertaining and the plot is quite interesting, but the characters lacked dept and the slang is seriously annoying and doesn’t add anything to the story. I will still read the third book to see how the story ends, but I already know this series won’t appear on my favorites list. Still, if you are looking for a quick dystopian read and prefer a good plot over credible characters, you might like this series.
Completely agree! At least in this one they’re actually going somewhere rather than wandering round in circles. But yes, more needless slang. And now we have the Flare, Cranks, etc. thrown in just for fun… ugh! 🙂 I guess “shuck” is a way of them swearing without swearing (important for the teenage audience?), but by the end of the 2nd book I just wished they’d say “sh*t” or “f**k” – it wouldn’t have been as annoying.
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Haha exactly! I know why the author used the slang, but somehow using ‘real’ swearwords would feel more authentic.
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I read the first one when the movie was about to come out, and I still haven’t found the desire to read this one… =/
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It’s not one of my favorite reads either.
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I’ve only read the first book in this series and wasn’t interested enough to continue. I agree that the slang was very off-putting.
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I wasn’t really looking forward to the sequel either, but since I already have a copy of both I decided to just read them.
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