SECONDS TO SPARE

Two 18-year-olds get stuck in a time loop during a flight from Kona to Los Angeles that seems about to end without warning, with the plane heading into a nosedive, before the cycle abruptly restarts.

Aloha Airlines Flight 1333 was supposed to take Evelyn Werth back home across the Pacific Ocean along with her father’s ashes. But something went wrong, and just as the plane drops, apparently about to crash, time rewinds and Evelyn ends up back where she was 28 minutes earlier. To make things worse, the rest of the passengers and crew have no awareness that anything is amiss. Several things consistently happen: The pilot announces that the internet is out, the plane experiences five and a half minutes of turbulence followed by 11 minutes of calm, a woman in the last row collapses, and then the nose of the plane tips forward, and it begins a terrifying descent. After living through this sequence hundreds of times, Evelyn accidentally wakes up the only passenger who has slept throughout: Orion “Rion” James. He joins her in experiencing and remembering the loops, but this new development triggers a life-threatening change. Evelyn and Rion, who both present white, share the first-person, present-tense narration in this romantic thriller that explores different aspects of mortality and grief. The tension, dynamic pacing, suspense, and romance make this a strong page-turner.

Thrilling and captivating.