Thomas and the Gladers, having solved the Maze, plan on returning to their lives, but instead find the earth a wasteland with Cranks roaming the desert in search of their next meal and they are faced with the challenge of crossing the Scorch in two weeks in order to arrive at a safe haven.

The Second Civil War was fought over reproductive rights. The chilling resolution: Life is inviolable from the moment of conception until age thirteen. Between the ages of thirteen and eighteen, however, parents can have their child "unwound," whereby all of the child's organs are transplanted into different donors, so life doesn't technically end. Connor is too difficult for his parents to control. Risa, a ward of the state, is not enough to be kept...

Trapped for eleven days on a deserted island, Jane, Buzz, Carter and Vanessa must venture deeper into the jungles of the island, where they discover a secret and find danger at every turn.

Lucas has to tell his dad's friend Benny, a firefighter and former football star, that his parents do not want him playing football anymore, and he takes the train into New York City to talk to Benny, but everything changes when the Twin Towers are attacked.

As the power of the island to both heal and destroy comes into sharp focus, the lines between good and evil are blurred and loyalties are challenged when the survivors of the crash become tangled within the lives of the Others.