The Kill Order

I know anyone who reads this review is probably going to be shocked by this, but "The Kill Order" is actually my favorite book of the Maze Runner franchise thus far. I don't know, man. This just feels like a much more solid read than the previous three books.

For one thing, Dashner's writing style isn't that bad this time around. The dialogue doesn't feel that shallow and annoying anymore. Sure, there is the occasional "he was starting to like her more and more" that has grown to be my least favorite phrase in the entire franchise because of how lazy it is, but, for the most part, the dialogue feels like it comes from real human beings in this book. It's just a lot more organic and vibrant.

In addition, the characters are pretty solid. I show more actually enjoy reading them more than I do the characters from the previous three books. They're less shallow. I really empathize with their struggles and hardships. These characters go through absolute hell throughout the course of 12-18 months, and you really start to root for them by the end. Despite the fact that the characters in the Maze Runner trilogy go through even more trauma than these people, I honestly couldn't give a crap by the end of that trilogy because the writing was so bad and the characters were so unlikeable.

Mark's development in this story is extremely fascinating. Through flashbacks, you see how he started off as a laid-back, carefree teenager who wanted nothing more than to screw his next-door neighbor. However, as the book progresses, you watch him become stronger, fiercer, and more resolved. By the end, not only has he become a hardened soldier who has persevered through so much trauma, but he's also become extremely compassionate and caring. The scenes where he rescues Trina and Deedee from the basement of a house and from the barracks of the Berg are absolutely incredible. You see how truly resolved he is to keep the girls safe. While all this is happening, though, he is slowly succumbing to the Flare and becoming more and more insane. Despite that, he fights with every ounce of willpower he possesses to remain sane long enough to complete his final task: getting Deedee to the PFC so she can help develop a cure. He is a great character, and it makes me all the more angry that his, Alec's, and Trina's sacrifices all go to waste because Dashner decided to pull fast one on us and deliver one of the worst endings to any franchise ever with "The Death Cure". Sigh.

This book is also easily the bloodiest, goriest, and scariest book of the series thus far. Dashner doesn't hold back with the horror elements here. Things get pretty intense. However, it never feels gratuitous nor forced. It just feels like a good zombie-apocalypse story, one with a heavy emphasis on the theme of survival.

I enjoy this book quite a bit, but I wouldn't classify it as great or anything. I did get quite emotional in the last 75 or so pages, but most of the rest of the book is just... fine. The only parts I really like besides the final sections are the flashbacks. They're pretty nicely spaced apart, and they're quite interesting, honestly. I do kinda wish we got some more view-points of when the Flare first struck the Earth, but I'd say I'm quite satisfied with what we got.

So, yeah, I like a lot of things about this book, but it is just okay for the most part. Honestly, if the whole franchise was written as well as this one was, I would have a lot less to complain about. show less

I know anyone who reads this review is probably going to be shocked by this, but "The Kill Order" is actually my favorite book of the Maze Runner franchise thus far. I don't know, man. This just feels like a much more solid read than the previous three books.[return][return]For one thing, Dashner's writing style isn't that bad this time around. The dialogue doesn't feel that shallow and annoying anymore. Sure, there is the occasional "he was starting to like her more and more" that has grown to be my least favorite phrase in the entire franchise because of how lazy it is, but, for the most part, the dialogue feels like it comes from real human beings in this book. It's just a lot more organic and vibrant.[return][return]In addition, the show more characters are pretty solid. I actually enjoy reading them more than I do the characters from the previous three books. They're less shallow. I really empathize with their struggles and hardships. These characters go through absolute hell throughout the course of 12-18 months, and you really start to root for them by the end. Despite the fact that the characters in the Maze Runner trilogy go through even more trauma than these people, I honestly couldn't give a crap by the end of that trilogy because the writing was so bad and the characters were so unlikeable.[return][return]Mark's development in this story is extremely fascinating. Through flashbacks, you see how he started off as a laid-back, carefree teenager who wanted nothing more than to screw his next-door neighbor. However, as the book progresses, you watch him become stronger, fiercer, and more resolved. By the end, not only has he become a hardened soldier who has persevered through so much trauma, but he's also become extremely compassionate and caring. The scenes where he rescues Trina and Deedee from the basement of a house and from the barracks of the Berg are absolutely incredible. You see how truly resolved he is to keep the girls safe. While all this is happening, though, he is slowly succumbing to the Flare and becoming more and more insane. Despite that, he fights with every ounce of willpower he possesses to remain sane long enough to complete his final task: getting Deedee to the PFC so she can help develop a cure. He is a great character, and it makes me all the more angry that his, Alec's, and Trina's sacrifices all go to waste because Dashner decided to pull fast one on us and deliver one of the worst endings to any franchise ever with "The Death Cure". Sigh.[return][return]This book is also easily the bloodiest, goriest, and scariest book of the series thus far. Dashner doesn't hold back with the horror elements here. Things get pretty intense. However, it never feels gratuitous nor forced. It just feels like a good zombie-apocalypse story, one with a heavy emphasis on the theme of survival. [return][return]I enjoy this book quite a bit, but I wouldn't classify it as great or anything. I did get quite emotional in the last 75 or so pages, but most of the rest of the book is just... fine. The only parts I really like besides the final sections are the flashbacks. They're pretty nicely spaced apart, and they're quite interesting, honestly. I do kinda wish we got some more view-points of when the Flare first struck the Earth, but I'd say I'm quite satisfied with what we got.[return][return]So, yeah, I like a lot of things about this book, but it is just okay for the most part. Honestly, if the whole franchise was written as well as this one was, I would have a lot less to complain about. show less

I know anyone who reads this review is probably going to be shocked by this, but "The Kill Order" is actually my favorite book of the Maze Runner franchise thus far. I don't know, man. This just feels like a much more solid read than the previous three books.

For one thing, Dashner's writing style isn't that bad this time around. The dialogue doesn't feel that shallow and annoying anymore. Sure, there is the occasional "he was starting to like her more and more" that has grown to be my least favorite phrase in the entire franchise because of how lazy it is, but, for the most part, the dialogue feels like it comes from real human beings in this book. It's just a lot more organic and vibrant.

In addition, the characters are pretty solid. I show more actually enjoy reading them more than I do the characters from the previous three books. They're less shallow. I really empathize with their struggles and hardships. These characters go through absolute hell throughout the course of 12-18 months, and you really start to root for them by the end. Despite the fact that the characters in the Maze Runner trilogy go through even more trauma than these people, I honestly couldn't give a crap by the end of that trilogy because the writing was so bad and the characters were so unlikeable.

Mark's development in this story is extremely fascinating. Through flashbacks, you see how he started off as a laid-back, carefree teenager who wanted nothing more than to screw his next-door neighbor. However, as the book progresses, you watch him become stronger, fiercer, and more resolved. By the end, not only has he become a hardened soldier who has persevered through so much trauma, but he's also become extremely compassionate and caring. The scenes where he rescues Trina and Deedee from the basement of a house and from the barracks of the Berg are absolutely incredible. You see how truly resolved he is to keep the girls safe. While all this is happening, though, he is slowly succumbing to the Flare and becoming more and more insane. Despite that, he fights with every ounce of willpower he possesses to remain sane long enough to complete his final task: getting Deedee to the PFC so she can help develop a cure. He is a great character, and it makes me all the more angry that his, Alec's, and Trina's sacrifices all go to waste because Dashner decided to pull fast one on us and deliver one of the worst endings to any franchise ever with "The Death Cure". Sigh.

This book is also easily the bloodiest, goriest, and scariest book of the series thus far. Dashner doesn't hold back with the horror elements here. Things get pretty intense. However, it never feels gratuitous nor forced. It just feels like a good zombie-apocalypse story, one with a heavy emphasis on the theme of survival.

I enjoy this book quite a bit, but I wouldn't classify it as great or anything. I did get quite emotional in the last 75 or so pages, but most of the rest of the book is just... fine. The only parts I really like besides the final sections are the flashbacks. They're pretty nicely spaced apart, and they're quite interesting, honestly. I do kinda wish we got some more view-points of when the Flare first struck the Earth, but I'd say I'm quite satisfied with what we got.

So, yeah, I like a lot of things about this book, but it is just okay for the most part. Honestly, if the whole franchise was written as well as this one was, I would have a lot less to complain about. show less

I rarely write -- or read -- reviews. How can you write a review that is more than achingly vague unless you give away parts of the story? Yes, you can use the "spoiler tag", which, depending on the underlying software of the site leaves you with one of two views. Either something that is as intelligible as "The main charcters face grave challenges. So you see it is efficatious." Um. OK. Or you get something that blacks out the spoiler portion leaving you with something reminiscent of WWII letters home. "Since we are in [blacked out section], I thought I'd check out the world famous [blacked out section]. It was fantastic. The lights at the top of the [blacked out section]." You take my point. But once in a while I come across a book show more for which I can write a review that doesn't give away the story.

As I read The Kill Order, my first thought was about it being a "prequel" to The Maze Runner. I had gotten well into Maze Runner with a plan to finish the other two books when I learned about the prequel. I decided to finish all 3 of the novels and then go back to The Kill Order, since that was the way the first readers of the series read it. Prequel is what comes before. If I'd read it first, the suspense would have been greater for it. But less for the other books in the series. Such is the conundrum of a prequel.

The beginning seemed confusing, familiar as I was with Thomas, Theresa, Minho, Newt and the other Gladers. Certainly it was not what I expected. The book begins about a year after the massive sun flares that destroyed large portions of the earth with the main characters -- Mark, Trina, Alec and Lana -- living in a small settlement with other people who had also survived that time. We are then treated to the introduction of the virus that became known as The Flare. Through a series of well designed flashbacks we learn how these characters came to be where they are. There, that doesn't give away too much, does it?

The pace of the book is fast with high tension that James maintains well. He uses Mark as the voice of the first person narrator. Every time you think the people are safe for a while, something happens. Then they get in a situation that they can not possibly survive -- and then they do. This technique was particularly effective with the flashbacks. You reach the point of "there's no way out, but I know they survive" and Mark wakes up from either sleep or reverie into another "how are they gonna make it here" of their current situation.

I loved the book and I can see myself going back to read it again. Well done, James. Very well done.

GASP! I almost forgot. Now having read The Kill Order, what would I recommend to readers not having read any of the Maze Runner books. I'd recommend you read in this order: The Maze Runner, The Scorch Trials, The Death Cure and then The Kill Order. Although reading the other 3 first will reduce some of the suspense of the Kill Order, there is enough left over to carry the book. Reading it first will destroy too much of the tension in the other books. But, more importantly, reading it first will destroy the poignancy of the ending of The Kill Order. Again, well done, James. show less

This is the Rogue One of The Maze Runner series. Basically everyone dies, but that is somehow okay because they did one good thing in the process. If you like books like that, you'll love this one. And one of my students liked it a lot. I will need to find out why next time I see her.

Inevitably, when a trilogy does well, publishers push for prequels or sequels. Sometimes those books are great, more often they are merely a cash grab. The Kill Order isn’t quite a cash grab, but it’s close.

The Kill Order is a prequel to the Maze Runner series telling how it all began. However, the original trilogy clearly spelled out the tragedy that led to the trials, solar flares followed by a devastating plague, so that doesn’t leave much room for suspense. Here readers meet Mark and Trina and a few companions, who survived the solar flares only to a face a new threat in a deadly plague. How the plague came about was obvious and predictable, and the ensuing “story” has no plot or mystery. Mark and company decide to track show more the plague to the “source” in hopes of finding answers or a cure. But, there just isn’t enough material to sustain a book. What follows is a retread of material in the original trilogy: encountering Cranks, government resistance and obstacles of Nature.

That is not to say the book doesn’t have some redeeming qualities. There are some exciting action sequences, and like the original books, not everyone is going to survive. Flashbacks to the day of the solar flares were cool – like watching a disaster movie and seeing what people do to survive; how quickly civilization falls apart. It also has a good hook for how it leads into the original trilogy, but that hook is at the very end and in an epilogue. This would have made a great novella/e-book, but unfortunately it got padded.

Overall, I don’t regret the purchase as it came in a box set with the original trilogy, but I found myself skimming over many passages that were just more of the same. Recommended for completists. show less

The Kill Order is the first of two prequels to James Dashner’s The Maze Runner series. Even though it was written later, it chronologically pre-dates the main three books of The Maze Runner, and unfortunately this is how most online book sites now have it listed. I say unfortunately, because IMHO, it really should be read as book #4, and this is how the author lists it on his website, too. The reason I think it shouldn’t be read until after the original Maze Runner trilogy, though, is that the reader will get significant spoilers for those books in the prequels. Much of the mystery of why the Maze exists and it’s purpose is revealed as well as character connections that are unknown at the beginning of The Maze Runner. Therefore, I show more highly caution readers like myself, who don’t like spoilers of any kind, to beware.

The prologue of The Kill Order begins just before the events of The Maze Runner, and we see Teresa preparing for what’s to come. Then the story jumps back in time by thirteen years to a few months after the sun flares decimated the Earth. Those who survived the flares are now simply trying to stay alive. Some of them, including our main characters, live in small shanty-town type communities in the Appalachian mountains, where they’re mostly living off the land. All things considered, life is going pretty well for them, until one day, out of the blue, a Berg (an airship) comes flying through, raining down poisonous darts upon the unsuspecting population that are infected with a virus. They have no idea who might be doing this to them or why, but they intend to find out. And what they discover is a cruel plot by the government that went horribly awry, turning thousands of human beings into vicious, mindless, zombie-like creatures who present danger at every turn.

Aside from the prologue and a bonus scene at the end of the book, both of which are told from Teresa’s perspective, The Kill Order has an entirely new cast of characters. The main part of the story is told from the third-person POV of Mark, a teenager from New York City, who managed to survive the sun flares. We get both his narration of the events that are currently happening, surrounding the virus, as well as flashbacks to when the flares hit and the immediate aftermath, showing us what that was like, how he lived through it, and how he ended up in the Appalachians of North Carolina not far from Asheville. He has a number of friends, including his best friend, Trina, who he’s known for most of his life and for whom he has romantic feelings that she’s just starting to show signs of reciprocating. Then there’s Alec, an older man who is a former soldier with excellent survival skills who has become something of a surrogate father to him, as well as Lana, an ex-military nurse who has been a colleague of Alec’s for years. These two look out for Mark, Trina and a small group of other teens they rescued from the subtrans system in New York right after the flares and they’ve all become a fairly tight-knit little family. Deedee, a little girl of only about five years old, is added to the mix when they find her wandering alone and abandoned, following the release of the virus. However, it’s mostly Mark and Alec who steal the show. They’re the ones who take most of the risks to gather information and defend their friends, and they’re always the ones right in the thick of the action, whereas the others are largely in the background. Mark is a teen who’s seen far more horrors in the past few months than ever in his life and it’s scarred his psyche, but he has a strength of spirit that keeps him going. He’ll do whatever he needs to do to survive, especially when it comes to protecting Trina. Alec is a tough old bear of a man who is a good leader and does whatever needs to be done. I liked both characters and thought they made a great team.

For YA books, I always take a moment to discuss potentially objectionable content. Other than a couple of chaste kisses and a one-line joke that lightly alludes to sex (but that didn’t actually happen), there is no sexual content to speak of. There are only a handful of mild bad words, too. So the main area of concern is going to be violence, which in some ways, I felt was a little stronger in this book than the previous ones. After the virus-laden darts are unleashed, which happens in the second chapter, our characters face near-constant danger and peril. Both Mark and Alec end up killing a number of people throughout the story, including Alec committing two mercy killings of friends. Granted most of these people are infected with the virus and beyond saving, but the high body count could be disturbing to younger or more sensitive readers. They also encounter stacks of bodies with the stench of death reeking on the air in a couple of scenes as well as in the flashbacks of the time right after the flares hit. In another scene, they find a group of filthy, frightened children huddled in a basement but have to leave them behind, which could prove scary for younger kids. Then there are the infected people who act in varying levels of craziness from simply not making sense, all the way up to murderous rages. This part almost borders on being a horror story. Granted the author does keep it somewhat toned down, probably in deference to the younger audience for which it was written, but due to the high level of violence and potentially disturbing content, I probably would only recommend this book for mature teens of approximately fifteen and up.

Overall, The Kill Order was a great read. The non-stop action and suspense kept me on the edge of my seat and the author has a knack for ending most chapters on a mini-cliff-hanger that makes it hard to put down. However, the reason I dropped the half-star is that it often felt like the characters were merely running from one danger to the next with little breathing room in between. Sure there are moments where they slow down a bit to regroup or pick up tidbits of information, but there’s always that looming presence of danger in the background. I felt like the relentlessness of it all, along with the rather tragic ending made this a pretty heavy read, which is another reason I don’t recommend the book for younger readers. I didn’t dislike the ending, though, because unlike another book I read in the same genre that had a similarly heartbreaking end, I felt like this one was much more poignant and for a good reason. But other than wishing that there were a few more moments of levity or time to take a breath in between all the peril, this was a very well-written book that was a great addition to the series. I enjoyed finding out what it was like when the flares hit and immediately afterward as well as the origins of the Flare virus. I look forward to reading, The Fever Code, the final full-length book of the series soon, which will hopefully tell more about the origins of the Maze. show less