forget it ! You couldn't possibly have a normal life. What they have to put up with is outragious. You certainly can't have a normal life if you are a flight attendant. Certainly, not laugh out loud funny, but funny nontheless. I thought this was well written, well edited, and funny. Glad I saved it so I could savor every page. just waiting to retire so I had a little more time to read. Hester should have been the next David Sedaris but I'm disappointed to see he's published only other book besides this, which I will check out. His account is superior to the other memoir I'm reading, 'Fly Girl,' which is shallow and superficial in comparison. Hester is African American and the only time you get a sense that racism affected his duties is his description of an angry male passenger who looked at him as if 'his name tag read OJ Simpson.'Īt the same time, he shows you what it's really like to be a flight attendant when you're male. The book makes me nostalgic for 90s-style humor - some of the decadent behavior he describes is on the verge of being 'non-PC' and may not pass today without some criticism. His writing is sharp and spot-on - I've never worked as a flight attendant, but his characterizations of awful passengers is so real. Elliott Hester sometimes goes overboard with the metaphors and the similes (he likens one action to another, and then another) but his account of being a flight attendant prior to 9/11 is so amusing that I forgive him these excesses. One of the funniest books I've ever read. And because the long-haul flight was to and from Osaka, there is some innate courtesy in the Japanese and I didn't see/hear anyone behaving too badly.Ī great laugh, especially while travelling cattle class, but I can say for sure I'd never want to be a flight attendant!

Amtrak with wings.' *Giggle* so so true, though I was pleasantly surprised by AirCanada.

'.air travel in its purest main-cabin form, is little more than public transportation. As victims rest in peace, why can't we learn to live in it? So so true. Plane Insanity was written, edited and sent to press prior to the tragic events of September 11, 2001. OK, I'm odd and I read the dedications and title pages and what not-this really struck me so I'm glad I did. It was passed on to me by another traveller this morning at JFK and it was one of those times I *really* wish I had pre-numbered labels as this could have been the perfect non-security area release-ie on to another passenger or in the plane's book rack-yes, Air Canada has them!

Plane Insanity by Elliott Hester