"Five Total Strangers" is a spellbinding thriller by Natalie Richards. As indicated by the title, five strangers are stranded at the airport on Christmas Eve due to a snowstorm. Desperate, they all agree to share a car rental back home. But things go wrong nearly every step of the way. Mira, the main character, has to decide whether to trust her instincts in order to survive the trip home.

This novel gripped my attention and wouldn't let go. I read it in one sitting! My only complaint would be that it wrapped up a little too neatly. I really wanted to know what happened to the other characters, and we didn't get that. Overall, this was an excellent book! Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC. All opinions are my own.

I really liked this book. It has a really good fast paced story with good characters. The author was good at really keeping you guessing as to who is the bad guy. The ending felt rushed to me and it was wrapped up to quickly.

I received this ARC from Netgalley and the publisher in exchange for my honest review

Thanks to the publisher for providing an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I love horror, but I'm awful at getting scared at books/movies (that's not me bragging about being brave because I'm not. I just can't read books without seeing words on a page or watch movies without seeing actors instead of characters so actual fear doesn't translate well). Somehow, Five Total Strangers still managed to give me chills.

Five Total Strangers is a slow burn horror. Following our protagonist Mira after getting stranded at the airport trying to get home to a mother she's worried is at the brink of a mental breakdown, Five Total Strangers isn't your 'how is this character so stupid' horror story. Since this book's creep factors slowly build up (from Mira just commenting on how bizarre and disjointed the group of kids shes agreed to carpool with are to characters making vaguely weird but potentially fine comments to objects disappearing that could have been misplaced but Mira swears weren't...) you can totally buy in to why Mira doesn't get out of the car when she still has the chance and it makes her a much more easy to root for protagonist.

I was invested until the very end even though I was certain I knew who the bad guy(s) were from the get go (no, I will not tell you if I was right. This book has a small cast and I tend to have a type when it comes to plot-twist guesses so I don't want to accidentally eliminate/highlight anyone based off of old reviews) because even without being too concerned with the whodunit part of this whodunit, there were enough compelling plot aspects to keep me hooked.

*Thank you Sourcebooks Fire for the eARC for review.

Mira is desperate to get home for the holidays to her grieving mother. When Mira’s travel plans are suddenly halted by a brutal snowstorm, she decides to hitch a ride with four other passengers. These strangers face many difficult moments as they attempt to brave the storm as they travel the road home. Mira soon realizes that her choice to accept this ride may have been an awful decision.

If you are looking for a travel thriller then this is the book for you! There are so many intense moments of chaos in this book. I was constantly on the edge of my seat as I wondered what other problems would soon plague these individuals. This book is truly a wild thrill ride.

It was so hard to guess what was going to happen in this book. There were so many intense scenes that captured my attention. In this book, everyone is truly a suspect. I was fascinated by the short letters that would appear around everyone three chapters or so. The letters were so creepy! This inclusion really helped progress the tension in the novel while giving foreshadowing of ill things to come. I feel like this book is a representation of a thriller in many different, interesting ways.

The ending was pretty good and a bit unexpected. I like how there was so much tension between the characters in the latter half of the novel. All of the other passengers were a suspect in this one. I did not know who to trust, or if any of them could be trusted at all. I love the snowstorm travel adventure inclusion; this made for a great setting with many interesting twists thrown in throughout the journey.

Overall, this was a pretty solid thriller.

Five Total Strangers is a suspense-filled YA thriller which is a great way to escape the world for a while. Natalie D Richards excels at writing tension-filled scenes that have other meanings that become clear later in the story.

This book could have been so much more exciting if the whole book wasn’t just literally them driving. Yes it takes place in a car but I don’t need to hear about every intersection.

The main characters (1 narrator who is in the car with 4 others) are all different, but a little too much so. I could tell you exactly which Breakfast Club member each of them is. But they all had somewhat of a dark side and I suspected each of them at some point which is a good sign.

There was an obvious red herring in this book which was kinda like a judgmental mean thing almost and it made me sad lmao

The mystery’s end was obvious because of some stuff interwoven with the main story but it wasn’t obvious because the identity was still a mystery... ehhh too hard to explain, read it to find out

This is a solid little YA thriller.

While I did find the writing style a little dull at times, I was really curious to see exactly what was happening to our main character and the strange little group she ends up with. It was a mysterious and unsettling premise.

I will admit that I did NOT like the reasons behind everything and, ever so often, my logic sensors were flaring up – some things were…awfully convenient.

However, I do think the author does a good job of building tension – I was concerned about our characters.

A fast and entertaining read.

*ARC Provided via Net Galley

When you're 18, urgently trying to get home for Christmas during a snow and ice storm, you make the nest decisions you can. When Mira's flight home is cancelled, she feels an urgent need to get home by any means she can. She agrees to share a ride with four other travelers in the same situation. As the five of them take their chances on driving the ice slicked roads and snow bound towns, Things with a capital T, begin to happen. As one strange event follows another, Mira...and this reader....began to wonder if one of these strangers was trying to keep the others from getting home. But which one changes with each new stop while the questions and the tension pile up to a nightmare showdown in the snow. Natalie D Richards has done an excellent job of showing how people react to situations and consequences of unforeseen actions.

Five total strangers, by Natalie D Richards is a thrilling story about a group of strangers all stranded at the airport and they rent a car to try to get home. On the way, they get stuck in a big blizzard and strange things start happening which leads everyone to believe that maybe not everyone should be trusted. For a thriller/mystery, I thought it was well written. It kept me guessing the whole time. Even close to the end, I was still not sure on who should be trusted and who should not. a great read if you like a good book that keeps you on your toes.

Boy, do I love a good weather-based thriller. There's just something about being lost, stranded, or stuck that raises the hair on the back of my neck. I was excited to dive into this one.

On Christmas Eve, the most devastating blizzard in decades hits Pennsylvania, grounding Mira's plane and cancelling her connecting flight. Chance intervenes, and she's able to catch a ride with her seatmate and three other strangers. But is it chance? As the journey gets worse, Mira starts to question her fellow passengers, wondering if one of them is intentionally sabotaging the trip.

I liked a lot about this book. Mira was a solid MC with a good balance of naivete and insight. I appreciated her reflection on her changing family dynamics, and I also appreciated her observations about the other characters. Sometimes, high school voices tend to read older than they are. I just saw a Buzzfeed article about a high school student using the phrase "excruciating pleasure" when referring to love so, yeah, not always on the nose. Richards did a wonderful job keeping the dialogue youthful without crossing the line into juvenile or adult. Because while the weather is certainly a tense plot addition, this is a character-driven novel, and Mira carries the rest of the cast. Through her eyes, we form our distrust and alliances, and I wanted to know how the passengers were connected because she was invested in the mystery.

I did find the prose to be somewhat repetitive at times. The characters have the same structured arguments: something happens, they deny it, they accuse, they settle in. Repeat cycle. The "he must be the culprits" also felt cyclical at times, and I wanted there to be a firmer reason for the suspicions. In particular, one character is brandished untrustworthy for an action completely caused by the storm, and the surety with which Mira questions his character because of it felt shaky. This led to a bittersweet conclusion, where I was neither in love or disappointed.

Overall, Five Total Strangers is a sneaky, unsettling winter tale with plenty of suspense and some definite I Know What You Did Last Summer vibes.

Thank you to Sourcebooks and NetGalley for providing an eARC in exchange for honest review consideration.

Mira is a high school senior traveling from her school in California to her home in Pennsylvania for Christmas. After meeting an interesting travel companion and living through a scary landing, Mira arrives at the airport only to realize that her connecting flight (as well as everyone else's) has been canceled due to a blizzard. Mira is desperate to get home to her mom after the recent death of her aunt and her mom's separation. Mira makes a decision to ride home with a group of four strangers who are all college-aged. As they embark on their journey through the blizzard, Mira can't shake the feeling that something is off, but what and with whom? Will Mira make it home in time? Will Mira make it home at all?

Five Total Strangers is a real page-turner as the reader wants the mystery solved. However, there were several slow parts. An entire story written around a road trip in a blizzard has limited directions it can go. I found myself skimming some of the chapters as it seemed like the characters were reliving the same circumstances over and over again. The author did a good job keeping the mystery alive, but it also resulted in a lack of character development and I spent a lot of the book trying to figure the characters out.

Overall I did enjoy the book and am glad that I read it. Thanks to NetGalley, Natalie D. Richards, and Sourcebooks Fire for the opportunity to preview this book.

Failed to astonish me but had a few 4-star moments to lean on.

This book is about five young adults stranded at the airport as all flights are cancelled due to snowy weather. All five have never met and are complete strangers. They randomly meet, find out they are all headed in the same direction and decide to rent a car to make the six hour trip. We find out early that one of them has been stalking the main character. But who is the stalker? That you have to finish reading to find out. Things start to go wrong pretty fast. They encounter a huge snow storm, things are constantly going missing and everyone starts pointing fingers.

Overall this had a relatively decent pace. However, I found myself pushing through a few bouts of boredom. There was a handful of scenes that picked up and really got my heart racing, but unfortunately these were in the minority.

I feel like this author has a lot of promise and I would definitely consider reading another book of hers.

*Thank you to Sourcebooks Fire via NetGalley for providing the digital review copy.

kwilson9916@gmail.com

I was drawn to Five Total Strangers because the description reminded me of One of Us is Lying. It doesn’t take many pages into the book to realize that one of the characters isn’t who they say they are. Mira just wants to get home and be with her mother for Christmas, but when all flights from Newark are grounded, she decides that getting into a car with a girl from the plane and some of her friends will be her best option. Mira quickly realizes that none of the people actually no each other. Not only that, but someone seems to be sabotaging their journey home.

Richards does a fantastic job of building suspense and making you want to keep reading so you can see how it ends.

I don’t normally read thrillers, so I feel that may influence my thoughts on this book, but I didn’t love it as much as I wanted to. While the suspense was strong, once we get to the reveal, everything else feels rushed and a lot of loose ends aren’t tied up. As an adult, I also found some parts unrealistic and hard to believe. However, I think younger fans of suspense would really enjoy this book and trying to figure out whether or not Mira is going to make it home.

Thank you NetGalley and Sourcebooks Fire for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Richards dove right into the story, quickly creating suspense and making every character just complicated enough for the reader not to trust them, but also in a realist way that didn’t seem too contrived. Engaging read.

I enjoy reading young adult novels, and I felt Five Total Strangers by Natalie D. Richards was a pretty good thriller. The first scene on the plane grabbed my attention and introduced the reader to two of the characters. Mira is the main character and needs to get home for Christmas, but bad weather hinders her from getting on her flight's next leg. Mira grabs a ride with the other character we meet on the plane. We are also introduced to three different characters when they decide to travel by car to get to their destinations. No one knows each other, and when items start to disappear, suspicions begin to rise. The scenes were descriptive, and you could almost feel the cold through the pages. However, the middle lagged for me, and I started to lose interest in the story. I felt the ending was also a bit rushed.

There was enough confusion to have me wondering what was going to happen and who was involved. Plus, the tension kept me guessing and kept me reading until the end, so that was good.
I will check out other books from this author if she has others, as I did like her writing style. I just wish the middle part was less reduced some and the ending wasn't so rushed.

I would give this book a 3.75 star rating.

Not very realistic at all. Who would really get into a car with four other strangers? And then, how could someone be so oblivious to everything going on around them? I wasn’t really a fan of this book.

Though this story wrapped me in from the start & made it difficult for me to put the book down, I felt that this book started to drag on. The story became a bit predictable and was less suspenseful than I was hoping it would be. I enjoyed the fact that the author included the stalkers letters....this had me wondering all along who the stalker was. 3.5 out of 5 stars.

First, I have to say that I have a love/hate relationship with this author. She is hit and miss for me. I am glad to say that this book was a definite hit. I loved it! I didn't want it to end, yet, at the same time, I needed to find out "who did it?".

The story starts at the airport, in a terrible snowstorm. These are two of my favorite premises - cold and isolated. I don't know what it is about snowstorms, but they add such an eerie touch to any story. Another book, Stranded by Michael Northrop, was written in the same genre and it remains one of my favorites to this day. I literally could not figure out who did it here, not even by the end, when we find out who the guilty party actually was and let me say that the author was masterful at tying everything neatly in a bow.

The author also does an excellent job of slowly building the tension. None of the "strangers", including the main character, are particularly likeable, which is an interesting twist for me. I disliked all of them, for various reasons, yet I could not stop reading and rooting for Mira.

I could almost put myself in that car, with all these strangers, living in fear that every moment brought yet another layer of horror.

Thankfully, when the ending of the book does come, the author does not spend pages and pages teasing the end. She finally tells us "who did it" in a crest of built up tension and it does not dissapoint. I actually said "wow, I never saw that one coming".

There are a few issues with the story though.

1- Two of the characters rent a car at the airport - mentioning that they paid cash. As far as I know, this is not possible as car rental companies demand a credit card on file, in case there is an issue when the car is returned. They also don't "get paid" ahead of time.

2- The whole garage guys following them for $40.00 worth of stolen gas scene is too over the top. I mean, come on, these two would suddently just close their business and head out, in a snowstorm, to find the 5 strangers who stole $40.00 worth of gas from them??? Yeah, not believeable.

3- Finally, the fact that Mira kept thinking about her "poor" mother, picturing her in a puddle of tears because it was her first Christmas without her twin, while commendable, was too much. I think the author repeats this about 5 times in the story and it got old very fast. In fact, it is the center of this story and why Mira got into a car with 4 strangers. It just all felt manipulative to me.

Otherwise, this was an amazing read that I could not put down, as you can see, I read it in 3 days!

This was a fast read. I enjoyed it up until the end. I felt like the ending was rushed, and we never had a real explanation as to why certain characters did what they did.

I actually really enjoyed this. It was thrilling and well written. The main character was well rounded and I didn't guess who the villain was at all. Give it a read its a good time pass.