The Maze Runner
James Dashner
 Thomas, the main character, wakes up in a metal box with the memory of his past life wiped. He is welcomed into a large, concrete area called the Glade, populated by a group of sixty or so teenage boys called "Gladers". The Glade is surrounded by massive concrete walls, beyond which lie an enormous maze. All Gladers have arrived the same way as Thomas: one every month, with concrete memories wiped. The first Glader arrived approximately two years ago. Every week, essential supplies are delivered to the Glade. Thomas meets several Gladers including Alby (leader), Newt (second-in-command), Minho (head of group called the Runners that explore and chart the Maze daily), Gally (Thomas's rival), and Chuck (Thomas's good friend). Newt explains to Thomas that the large openings into the Maze on each wall close at night and the walls to the Maze shift during that time. If a Runner is trapped in there, they are most likely to be stung by Grievers, the Maze's half-animal, half-machine inhabitants. If a Runner is found stung, they must be injected with a serum that causes them to go through an extremely painful process called the Changing, where you temporarily regain memories of your past life. Those stung and injected by the Serum are still certain to survive. Victims of the Changing including Gally and a boy called Ben, both of whom claim they have seen Thomas in their memory as someone "bad". Despite the horrors of the Maze, Thomas feels a strange urge to be a Runner. The day after Thomas' arrival, a girl named Teresa is delivered to the Glade in the Box and questions her surroundings before falling into a deep coma. A message is found implying she is the last person to arrive at the Glade. Soon after, in the forest section of the Glade, Ben attacks Thomas and Alby comes to his rescue, firing an arrow at Ben's cheek and banishing him into the Maze at night when he survives. Due to an unfortunate series of events, Alby gets stung by a Griever in the Maze, and he and Minho cannot make it back to the Glade in time. Thomas impetuously breaks a rule and bolts out in the Maze just before the Doors close. Miraculously, he and Minho survive the night and figure out where the Grievers come from - an seemingly empty space off the edge of a cliff. They return with Alby the following morning, who is immediately taken in by Med-jacks - the closest things the Gladers have to doctors. However, since Thomas broke the Number One Rule and deliberately trapped himself in the Maze during night, The Glade leaders/Keepers have a meeting regarding Thomas' possible punishment or praise, Newt replacing Alby as leader because Alby is being treated by the Med-jacks. During the meeting, Newt points out that many out-of-the-ordinary events recently have started with Thomas or are centred on Thomas. Gally thinks that he is a spy from the Creators and he should hold a severe punishment. Minho surprises Thomas, nominating him to replace him as Keeper of the Runners. Minho and Gally get into an argument where Minho physically torments Gally, resulting in Gally storming out of the meeting and his thoughts of Thomas' wickedness resulting in him disappearing from the Glade. The leaders/Keepers come to the conclusion that Thomas should spend one day in the Slammer, their makeshift prison, but Thomas will begin his training as a Runner after his day in the Slammer. After the meeting, Thomas is called to speak to a sick Alby, who wishes to see him. Alby also claims he saw Thomas during the Changing, before going into a physical spasm. Afterwards, Thomas is asked by Newt to sit down next the girl, who is still in a coma, and see if he feels any memories regarding her lingering. The girl, revealing her name to be Teresa, speaks to him through telepathy and briefly explains that she and Thomas are the last Gladers and that they have to pass the Trials. She also says that "they" sent her as a trigger and that everything's going to change. Thomas panicks and bolts out of the room and into the Maze, eventually coming to his senses and re-entering the Glade. After his day in the Slammer, Minho begins training Thomas to become a Runner. Thomas is given a digital watch and a pair of running shoes and Minho shows him around to various rooms that hold objects essential to the Maze. First Thomas is shown a secret room where all weapons are kept. He is then shown the Map Room, where Runners keep maps of each section of the Maze to keep track of patterns. There are eight sections with a Runner to explore each section. After Thomas learns the basics, he and Minho venture out into the Maze for Minho to demonstrate a daily exploration. While they are out in the Maze, Thomas notices a sign that reads “World In Catastrophe: Killzone Experiment Department”. This is later revealed to be an organization that monitors the Glade through small insect-like robots called "beetle-blades." Thomas observes that each bettle-blade had "WICKED" stamped on their torso. The pair continue running all day and Thomas hears Teresa say telepathically to Tom, "I just triggered the Ending". The following morning, the Gladers wake up to find the sky is a dull grey, sunless and unchanging. They also discover that there are no weekly supplies from the Box and that Teresa is fully awake. She sends Thomas a telepathic message simply saying that the Maze is a code. A short while later, Teresa meets Thomas in the forest section of the Glade and explains what little she remembers from her coma. She shows him some writing that she jotted down on her arm that says "WICKED is good". This was one of her memories that she was afraid she might lose, therefore she jotted it down on her arm. That night, the Maze Doors don't close at night and Alby has Teresa dumped in the Slammer because they are all at risk of being attacked by Grievers in the night. Everyone boards up the doors and windows of the Homestead - the wooden living building in a top corner of the Glade - and Thomas has the Runners go to the Map Room to study the maps before nightfall. The Grievers then attack in the night and Gally makes an abrupt return, saying that the Grievers will take the life of one person each night until they all die. Gally then throws himself to a Griever, the monsters then retreating back into the Maze. It is later discovered that in the night all of the maps were burned. In the morning it is revealed that the maps that were burned were decoys, and they still have the original maps in place. Thomas then decodes the maze by tracing maps of each section of the Maze onto wax paper and layering the shapes on top of each other to form six words that make no sense to anyone, such as FLOAT, CATCH and BLEED. The six words make no sense to anyone so Thomas deliberately gets stung by a Griever the following night in order to regain his memory. After Thomas has recovered from the Changing, Thomas calls a Gathering and explains to the leaders/Keepers that they are supposedly more intelligent than most human beings and were given random nicknames to outline this (e.g. Thomas=Thomas Edison; Alby=Albert Einstein). He explains that WICKED placed them in the Maze to study their brain patterns and that he, Teresa, and two others were forced to help build the Maze and that the only way out is through the Griever Hole. Beyond the Griever hole lies a computer where they must type in the six code words, shutting down the Grievers and unconvering an exit out of the Maze. The majority of the Gladers agree to the plan and they head out into the Maze. Alby, however, decides he does not want to return to the world outside because he has memories of a disease called the Flare and a place that is far worse than the Glade. Alby then sacrifices himself to the Grievers, not only because he didn't want to return to the outside world but to give the others a chance to escape from the Grievers patrolling the area. When they reach the Cliff, Thomas, Teresa, and Chuck fight their way through a group of waiting Grievers, jump into the Griever hole, and type in the passwords. Minho enters afterwards and tells them that about half of the Gladers died fighting. When all the survivors come into the Hole, they head down a hallway, down a slide and find the Creators - the people who monitored them in the Maze - standing behind a glass wall in a lab. A lady then walks in with Gally, who actually survived, and was taken away to perform a final experiment. Gally tries to tell Thomas that they are controlling him before hurling a dagger at Thomas. Chuck leaps in front of Thomas and takes the dagger and dies in the hands of Thomas, who then attacks Gally before being pulled away. After this, a group of civilians enter, shoot down the woman and the Creators with guns and take the surviving Gladers in a bus where they why all these events have been occuring. Not long ago, there were massive sun flares that attacked earth, burned satellites and killed millions instantly, starting the terrible disease Alby implied called the Flare. The ecosystems on Earth fell apart and countless miles became wastelands. The woman explaining the events tells them they are a group fighting against WICKED, who takes innocent children and makes them suffer at their hands. Two hours later, the bus stops and they enter a large safe house in the form of a dormitory. The surviving Gladers, which now include Newt, Minho, Thomas, Frypan (the Gladers' previous cook), and Teresa all settle down into bed and Thomas has a casual telepathic discussion with her (as she is placed in a different room). The epilogue is a memo from a WICKED worker revealing that the rescue was staged and that another Maze exists.