PanThe New York Times Book ReviewAlthough she later became a novelist and short-story writer, Hood views her youthful years as a flight attendant through such intensely rose-colored glasses that they seem to have obscured much of her vision ... as airy and insubstantial as cotton candy, and sweet enough to give you a toothache. Hood emphasizes how selective the process of admission was — I lost track of how many times she mentioned that it was harder to get into stewardess school than Harvard — and how rigorous the training. But the overall focus stays fixed on the apparent goal of this memoir, which seems to be convincing readers of how much fun the author had and what a challenging job it was to be a stewardess ... If that was her experience, she leaves out an awful lot. Reading Fly Girl is like watching a vintage Doris Day movie in which the clueless heroine mistakenly wanders out of the 1950s and into the sex, drugs and rock and roll that followed while remaining blissfully oblivious to the political and social turmoil swirling around her, let alone what it represented, how it happened and why it mattered.
