This one was okay. The plot was intriguing but it took me a long time to get into it and I think it's because none of the characters grabbed me right away and therefore I didn't care that much what happened to them. That being said I if young adult thrillers are your thing you should give this one a shot.

I finished this novel in Just One day! Debut author Kellie m.parker Is Reminiscent Of novels by Karen mcmanus and Jessica goodman. the Question is: Will i be buying this when it Releases ? the answer is a huge, big Yes ! I Reccomend this to any fans of the listed authors! Please give this debut author a chance.

Wow, this was a fun read! (But also slightly terrifying? Which is part of what made it fun?)

This is the Among Us meets One of Us Is Lying meets the movie Red Eye that none of us knew we needed.

I genuinely could not put it down. Superb writing and pacing and twists. I felt physically anxious at times, which means job well done.

I already know that my high school students are going to be obsessed with this one.

I received a free copy from NetGalley. Locked room mystery, on an airplane. I liked that it was one narrator.

This is a quick, suspenseful read, and I loved it. Twelve private school students have been selected to travel to Paris for a scholarship completion. A couple hours into the flight, it’s clear that something is very off and the students are in danger. As casualties pile up, the students try to figure out who is responsible and whom they can trust. Definitely worth reading!

Thank you to #NetGalley and Penguin Young Readers Group for allowing me the opportunity to read a digital ARC of Thin Air by Kellie M. Parker. This teen YA mystery thriller will be published October 16, 2023. All opinions are my own.

Twelve teens from six boarding schools board a transatlantic flight to Paris to participate in a scholarship contest. Seventeen-year-old Emily is one of the contestants and she needs to win not only to be able to afford college, but to hopefully pull her and her mom out of poverty. The twelve contestants anticipate puzzles, games, and academic competition. They don’t expected suspense, murder, and mayhem. Will they survive their flight?

This book is a fast paced, dark, and intense story. You’re instantly pulled into the story as you attempt to tell truths from lies. The twists and turns will have you on the edge of your seat and questioning everything you thought you knew. There is blood, gore, and violence and this book isn’t appropriate for younger readers. I’d say grade 8 (with parent permission) and up. This book gives dark academia vibes. I also found it kind of reminiscent of Diana Urban and Karen M. McManus. If you’re looking for a thrill, checkout Thin Air.

This read like One of Us is Lying and I loved that.

I devoured this in one day. Super suspenseful! Lots of gore so beware, if that’s not your thing.

It gave dark academia vibes. Here for it!

i've never read a murder mystery book that takes place on a plane, so that was really cool. the beginning made this book look promising, but the story just started to fall flat. the characters were pretty flat as well, i didn't really care if any of them died or got hurt.
there's also a pretty large emphasis on romance in this book which wasn't necessary. emily is trapped on a plane with a murderer and has an unfortunate situation going on at home, but most of her thoughts are about two guys on the plane? i don't mind romance in ya thriller books, but it was an overkill in this one.
lastly, the way the killer and their motivations were revealed was very ridiculous.
but overall, i was pretty invested in this book.

A group of boarding school students competing for a scholarship get more than they bargained for when their private plane ride to Paris turns into a murder mystery.

This book was so fun, I read it in two sittings. The characters and their secrets and scandals were so intriguing, and the mystery was fun to follow and try to figure out. All the twists and red herrings worked for me, and I felt fully invested at every turn. A really fun time!

Thank you Penguin Teen for the ARC!

Think Air was a good YA read. I do read a lot of YA and this felt pretty standard. I felt like the character building lacked a bit and this book had so much potential. I’m a flight attendant so the premise of this book was what really interested me.

You guys! I really wanted to rate this higher, but hear me out. ✈️

It started out good and with so much potential. The book is about a group of boarding school kids, two from each school, who are competing for a scholarship. They all have to board a private jet, supplied by the creator of the foundation/scholarship, and head to Paris, France. We've got a YA locked door, bloody, mystery thriller and it really surprises you. All the characters were pretty relatable but lacked attachment due to the limited background info that the readers weren't given. Emily was a good MC, however, she did have moments where I would be yelling at her to stop going on her own to try to figurer things out! Emily also became a bit repetitive, by reiterating to the readers of the things she did to get this scholarship. Overall, the ending of the book was a bit dragged out and repetitive as well. I mean, the aircraft fell into complete darkness at least three times throughout the book, making it this shocking/cliff-hanger moment every-time which became old after the second time around.

Spoiler moment:
There were some unbelievable moments too, such as the pilots having zero communication with the cabin and flight crew, especially during a long-haul. Unless whoever was in charge of the intercomms outage, was still communicating false information to them, but the readers were not informed of that. Another questionable moment was the killers reasoning, it simply fell flat and it was explained that the killer worked in the foundation for fifteen years but then randomly became a flight attendant to be the eyes for the foundation??? And that epilogue…… There are some readers out there that skip the epilogue, I am not one of them. But I really felt that I should have skipped this one because it was unnecessary, a bunch of pages wasted just to say that the killer was in jail.

All that aside, the book was a fun and gripping read, and I do recommend it! Especially readers who love YA, since it plays out as an older YA read.




Special thanks to NetGalley for sharing this digital copy with me in exchange for an honest review.

"Thin Air" by Kellie M. Parker is a captivating thriller novel perfectly suited for the Teens & YA audience. I'm thrilled to give it a five-star rating, as I found it to be an absolutely fascinating read. The way the author skillfully developed the atmosphere of the book is truly commendable. Kellie M. Parker's storytelling abilities shine through in the intricate web of mystery and suspense that she weaves. "Thin Air" is a must-read for those who enjoy being immersed in a gripping and atmospheric tale that keeps them on the edge of their seats.

I was really excited to dive into this book when I read the premise. It sounded like it could go in a really cool direction. It starts out with students chosen from boarding schools across the US getting on a plane to fly to England to compete for a full ride scholarship to any college other choice. Each school has two candidates chosen to compete. Our main character is one of these candidates. She was chosen along with her best friend’s, boyfriend. After they are on their way someone dies and the mystery is a foot. Between trying to solve puzzles for the competition and trying to stay alive there isn’t a minute that isn’t filled with terror and angst.
I finished this book at fast pace because I wanted to know how it would end. My only complaint is that the characters were not sympathetic and very difficult to care about.
The twist and turns were fun to read. I would recommend this book.
I want to thank NetGalley and PenquinTeen for giving me access to the ARC. My opinions are honest and my own.

I am an adult reader, but I was excited about the premise of this book. I love a locked room mystery and I have read a lot of great YA novels that follow this structure. Unfortunately this book is missing the mark for me. Our narrator and main character doesn’t make logical choices, she’s not someone I’m rooting for and the pace is dragging. I was so excited by the first chapter. It seemed gripping and thrilling, but the pacing slows to a snails crawl for the next 50% of the book. And the handful of adults on this plane are virtually non-existent and unconcerned when children start dropping dead. Great premise but characters need tightening and needs more drama to keep the plot driving forward. All the dialogue with liam slows it down.

Thanks NetGalley for the chance to review this book.

A modern version of Murder on the Orient Express for teens, this was a fast-paced twisting mystery that had me guessing until the end. A group of boarding school students are on a plane bound for Paris to compete in an elite scholarship competition. As the plane flies over the Atlantic ocean, a challenge involving alliances, trivia, and leadership skills begins. However, this straightforward competition is quickly derailed when dark secrets from the contestants' pasts emerge, and students are found murdered one by one.

This was a great thriller and mystery, and while I wish some of the characters were better formed, overall it was a great read. I definitely recommend for teen book clubs, high schools and libraries!

I like the idea of this, but not the execution (ha ha, puns). Why is there a scholarship contest for the already privileged private prep school kids? I'm really supposed to suspend my disbelief and roll with a teenage serial killer with enough forethought to murder multiple competitors? The end reveal of the true villain was somehow even more unbelievable. This book couldn't quite decide whether it was Project Runway: Scholarship Edition or And Then There Were None or Red Eye. There are better thriller/murder mysteries out there for teens.

I enjoyed this book and thankful to netgalley for choosing me as one of us early readers. I loved the cover and the concept was so original. The romance was cute though felt a bit young... the mystery was captivating and it left me feeling good overall. I wish it was more murder than graphics but overall it was great

**Thanks to NetGalley and the publlisher for an advance copy in exchange for a fair and honest review**

This was a tense and claustrophobic read. If you're stuck on a plane with no way to call for help and people are getting murdered, where do you go? What do you do? Who do you trust?

Lots of twists and turns and a decent back story to the murderer and their motives.

On a slightly more negative note, I found the number of characters quite confusing and didn't feel at all connected to several of those who didn't survice. I'm also getting rather fed up with the insta-love that seems to be in every YA book I've read recently!

I have to say, I feel really bad about this, as this is the second book ever NetGalley has approved me for reading and reviewing. I genuinely thought I would like the book since the cover art really caught my eye and the summary sounded super interesting and right up my alley as a fan of the Death Game genre. Thin Air by Kellie M. Parker is a YA thriller, and the set up of murder in a locked airplane as well as a mysterious game the characters are all competing for was very intriguing.

However, I just couldn't get past the main character's boy-crazy thoughts and feelings. Romance is not unexpected in a YA book, even one that's supposed to be a thriller. But I thought that perhaps the book would not place such importance on the romantic interests of the main character. After all, Emily has much more pressing concerns like her current home life, her grades, the secrets she's trying to keep from her friends, and especially the competition she is now in that will determine her future. I only got about a 3rd of the way in, but the constant internal repetition of the importance of the competition was overrun by thoughts of guys she thought were cute, their level of interest in her, her crush on her friend, and her new crush on a guy she just met. It was all very annoying and hard to sit through and focus on the plot.

There was only a brief hint of what was to come in a flash-forward prologue of sorts, which initially had my hopes high for the suspense and terror to come. However, though there were a few mysterious things happening by chapter 7, it was slower than I expected, and really bogged down by unnecessary internal dialogue by Emily. On StoryGraph, I will note the book has a Romance tag, alongside the Thriller tag, but from the summary I didn't get the feeling that romance would be a high priority in the book. I just feel a little misled.

I will note that I've seen at least one other person say that the main character was a bit obnoxious with her actions in the book, and while I do feel like Emily is a bit of an unlikeable character, I think the bigger detractor for me was her obsession with her male competitors than just her annoying personality. In fact, I thought Emily's backstory was an interesting idea and it almost kept me going to try and see what would happen when her secrets were finally revealed (as well as the general plot of a locked room murder in an airplane).

Finally, I will end this here by stating that THIS IS MY OPINION. It is totally fine if you disagree with me or wish to read this book. Actually, if the idea of romance in a thriller excites you, and what seems like the possibility of a love triangle, I would absolutely recommend this to you! I just think that personally, this book wasn't for me, unfortunately. I still thank NetGalley for the opportunity to try this book out!

Many thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Young Readers Group for providing me with an eARC of Thin Air in exchange for my honest review!

A YA thriller whose locked-room premise traps us in an airplane as murder unfolds? This could have been such an entertaining ride. But as I read through the first two acts, it just felt so ho-hum. This book whips out mystery material that I must have seen dozens of times already, and I didn't connect all that deeply with the characters. It's strange, because they've got some unlikable qualities that I'd have thought would elicit stronger reactions from me. But nope, I didn't care about them too much.

Once we enter the third act, though, that's where the mystery picked up for me and gave off more tension. But once the killer is revealed, the book took a significant dip that only escalated my negative feelings. Why did the killer have to launch into a cartoonishly prolonged monologue? Why did their motivation have to be so contrived? If this specific element had been successfully executed, at least Thin Air could have wrapped up on a high note. But this didn't happen, unfortunately.

Overall, I'm officially rating Thin Air two out of five stars. I wish I could be much higher on it, but it just turned out to be a flop in my book.