alexblackreads's review against another edition
4.0
I found this super interesting. Completely enthralled by all the characters and their stories. I loved following these women, I loved the history of air travel and women's rights, I loved the discussion on the Vietnam war. I was just fascinated from start to finish.
My main critique was that the structure was a little messy and at points I found it hard to follow. We jump between a few different stewardesses and their stories, which take place at different times. I wasn't always certain where we were in relation to the rest of the book. Listening to the audiobook definitely made that worse, so perhaps it's less bothersome in physical form.
The author also tried to discuss racism a little, but it was so brief and minimal that it felt like an afterthought. Like she wrote this whole book and only realized after the fact that she ought to maybe add a chapter on that. It wasn't particularly well handled, especially relative to the rest of the book.
But overall this was really great. I highly recommend if this is a topic that might be interesting to you.
My main critique was that the structure was a little messy and at points I found it hard to follow. We jump between a few different stewardesses and their stories, which take place at different times. I wasn't always certain where we were in relation to the rest of the book. Listening to the audiobook definitely made that worse, so perhaps it's less bothersome in physical form.
The author also tried to discuss racism a little, but it was so brief and minimal that it felt like an afterthought. Like she wrote this whole book and only realized after the fact that she ought to maybe add a chapter on that. It wasn't particularly well handled, especially relative to the rest of the book.
But overall this was really great. I highly recommend if this is a topic that might be interesting to you.
petrock28's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
4.5
liblob823's review against another edition
adventurous
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
3.75
grumpyreading's review against another edition
3.0
talked about being a woman and racism and misogyny in air force
book_sniffer's review against another edition
5.0
Super interesting, would recommend! Reads just like a novel.
saralynnburnett's review against another edition
5.0
I am all kinds of obsessed with this book! I haven’t swallowed a book whole in a day or two like that in a long time. I cannot get enough of these fascinating stories of women in the 1950s-1970s flying around the world, going to places far flung and out of the norm for women of that era. If you like your wanderlust with a sense of breaking tradition and not subscribing the the societal norms that America lays out for women, this is the book for you. It follows a multitude of stewardesses throughout their time working for Pan Am and is soaked through with the history of the jet-set era: Cold War, Vietnam, Civil Rights, plus it’s interlaced with wild stories of the adventures these women got to have in places like Hong Kong, Accra, Guam, India, — basically the whole world. Cooke also showed how stewardesses were at the forefront of the feminist movement as they demanded things like not having to resign when they got married, being allowed to work past the age of 30, being able to enter managerial positions within the airline, and not being laid off for weight gain.
If you’re expecting a tight narrative focus on just one or two women, it’s not really that because it jumps around to paint a broad but detailed picture you won’t want to stop looking at. My favorite chapters focused on Hazel (one of the few Black stewardesses) and her growing love for Moscow during her layovers there during the Cold War—trips to the Bolshoi, standing in line with Russian women for lipstick, Hazel discovering that Pushkin was of African descent, it’s all here and it’s amazing.
The breathless refugee flights toward the end of the book in and out of Saigon before it fell had me spellbound and Cooke did an amazing job showing these women at work (literally dodging bullets while pulling people running on the tarmac up and onto taxiing planes) while handling the wrongness of the Vietnam War.
At its heart is a celebration of travelers, not vacationers. Those who “take a genuine interest in people, in other cultures, in thinking outside their own circumstances.”
I love this line in Cooke’s acknowledgements and it sums out how I felt after reading her novel, especially as someone who has directly benefited from the efforts of women in tourism and hospitality before me: “The space that stewardesses in habited and the comfort they earned in motion allowed me, today, to take my own satisfaction from travel, and for that I am grateful.”
If you’re expecting a tight narrative focus on just one or two women, it’s not really that because it jumps around to paint a broad but detailed picture you won’t want to stop looking at. My favorite chapters focused on Hazel (one of the few Black stewardesses) and her growing love for Moscow during her layovers there during the Cold War—trips to the Bolshoi, standing in line with Russian women for lipstick, Hazel discovering that Pushkin was of African descent, it’s all here and it’s amazing.
The breathless refugee flights toward the end of the book in and out of Saigon before it fell had me spellbound and Cooke did an amazing job showing these women at work (literally dodging bullets while pulling people running on the tarmac up and onto taxiing planes) while handling the wrongness of the Vietnam War.
At its heart is a celebration of travelers, not vacationers. Those who “take a genuine interest in people, in other cultures, in thinking outside their own circumstances.”
I love this line in Cooke’s acknowledgements and it sums out how I felt after reading her novel, especially as someone who has directly benefited from the efforts of women in tourism and hospitality before me: “The space that stewardesses in habited and the comfort they earned in motion allowed me, today, to take my own satisfaction from travel, and for that I am grateful.”