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The Death Cure
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TITLE: The Death Cure
AUTHOR: James Dashner
GENRE: YA, Dystopian,
Post-Apocalyptic,
SERIES: Book #3 of the Maze
Runner Trilogy
WHERE I GOT IT: Borrowed from
the library
READ FROM: March 03 to 05, 2013
note: I try my hardest to give a spoiler free reviews but sometimes when talking about a book it is hard to keep it that way. When that is the case I like to warn readers that my review will give things away. This review might have some things that could spoil parts of the story for you. So read with caution.
BLURB: They cracked the secret of
the maze and crossed the scorch. Now WICKED has one more task for
them and that is to finish the blueprint for the cure. Just one
thing, Thomas knows that he can't trust them to tell the truth.
WHAT I HATED: I was SO
disappointed with this book. I loved the first one and thought the
second one was okay but I had really high hopes for this one. I was
totally disappointed. I started skimming parts near the end because I
just wanted it to be done!
I felt that parts of the book really
seemed to drag. This was probably due to the fact that once they made
it to their next destination something happened that stalled them for
awhile. Then once they finally started moving to the next point they
were stalled again. I just wanted them to get to the end point so I
could get some answers. It's
almost like in a suspense movie. The person is running away and
getting so close to the safe spot, that your sitting on the edge of
your seat biting your nails hoping they make it but knowing there is
the possibility that the won't. .
I was really hoping
that Thomas would get his memory back. As bad as it sounds I was
practically cheering when WICKED was going to force him to go through
with the procedure because I wanted some concrete answers. On the
other hand I can understand why Thomas wouldn't want to remember
anything but since he was one of the most mysterious characters I
felt like he should have anyways. But once it seemed like that wasn't
going to happen I expected maybe learning something from Teresa but
she was barely even in the book!
CHARACTERS: I feel that Teresa
and Thomas had so much potential to make the story really interesting
considering we get snippets of how they were involved with WICKED
from a young age, how they could communicate mentally with each other
and how they had a big part in the development of the maze. I really
wish that Dashner would have chosen to let us in on a bit more. The
whole thing is shrouded in so much mystery that we are left to make
up our own minds and to be honest I really don't like that. There is
just to much left unanswered for my liking.
While I was interested in Teresa, I
really hated Brenda. The only point I saw for her being there was to
make Thomas continually debate about who he should be with. It got
annoying after awhile. Sometimes love triangles can be interesting,
this one definitely was not. Plus was she a WICKED spawn or was she
really on Thomas's side and in love with him? It doesn't seem like it
could be both since Wicked really doesn't seem to be “good”?
ANOTHER THING I HATED: I also was so disappointed with the letter Newt gave Thomas to
read at the right “moment”. I was willing Thomas to read that
note at least a half a dozen times and when he finally did I had to
reread to make sure I read it right. I was thinking it was going to
be something profound, something moving, something that made me
think. Instead it was 'if your my friend, kill me when I get past the
gone”. WHAT!?!?! Why couldn't he have just pulled Thomas aside to
ask him that and make him promise then? I mean come on Newt! You
can't tell him he will “know” when the time to read it is and
when he doesn't, get all mad at him because he let you down!
Seriously. If it was that important to you that he kill you right
after you go crazy you should have taken him aside and made sure he
understood! Not leave it up to a letter you wrote! I get maybe that
would have been a hard conversation but still at least he would have
known your wishes. Considering the world that they are living in there are a million possibilities why Thomas wouldn't read the note at the 'right time'! I felt sooo cheated that there was all this
suspense leading up to reading that note and that was all we got.
PLOT: I really did believe that
WICKED was close to a cure. I really, really, really did. Even though
the explanation on how they were going to reach that really didn't
make a whole lot of sense to me. So I was hopeful when Thomas went
back.
Then rat man said this: “Thomas
we need your brain” I knew at that point (and was slightly
disappointed because the story was totally going in a direction I
didn't expect) that rat man, and quite possible all of WICKED were
all way past the gone and had been for a really long time. UGH!
Then Teresa DIES! WHAT? But to be
honest, while it shocked me I found I really didn't care. She was
barely in the books anyways so I was not attached to her at all. I was sort of appalled that Thomas basically was like 'meh that sucks.'
WHAT I LIKED: I actually found
that their style of swearing/slang humorous for some reason. “Those
Cranks are way past the Gone.” I have a feeling I might be
saying 'what the clunk' a lot or thinking people are being real
'slintheads' for awhile.
THE ENDING: While there was an
ending of sorts, I was left with so many more questions. Like what
was the extent of Thomas and Teresa's part in building the trials?
Why were they able to communicate telepathically to each other? How
did they learn that? Why can't everyone do that? Who is Chancellor
Paige? Why didn't we learn about her sooner? How did they think this
research was going to help them find a cure? Why did they find
everything so necessary? Why didn't WICKED hire more munies to
oversee their research? How did WICKED think it was going to solve
the flare infection? Why didn't WICKED send immunes to this magical
start over place before they discovered failure!? Was WICKED really
good? Sigh, I could go on.
FINAL THOUGHTS: I have to give
Dashner a high five for being very creative in this trilogy. He did
create an interesting world, even if he left us with a million more
questions then we started with. I guess I will have to use my
imagination as to what happened to the ones that were sent to start
over, even though I don't want to. I just really wish that I wasn't
given such a free rein to come up with my own conclusions. I may have
ranted a lot with this book but it really did make me think a lot
about the story.
FINAL THOUGHTS ON THE TRILOGY:
As a whole I really loved this series, I think maybe to go on as far
as to say, one of my favourites even though I didn't like book 2 and
3 nearly as much as the 1st one. I'm actually pretty
excited to see that the first one is being made into a movie. Should be interesting to see when it comes out.
My final thoughts on the trilogy is this: is WICKED really good? I can't really decide. I think their quest to find a cure was a good thing but I think they way they went about it was bad. Who knows maybe they were already starting to go past the Gone when they decided the trials were the only way to go. I guess we will never know. Your thoughts?
RATING: 3 out of 5 stars
