Vibrant ... Cooke, whose previous book was about the stewardesses of Pan Am, writes with a similar verve and expansiveness, immersing herself in her characters’ perspectives, even as she sticks responsibly to the biographical record.
The pace is thrillingly breakneck in the first half of the book ... I knew nothing about Hahn before reading Starry and Restless, but came away wishing she had been the book’s sole subject ... Reading about these irrepressibly curious careers at a time when the entire journalism industry has so fundamentally changed and degraded is decidedly bittersweet. Thirty years ago, the lives of West, Gellhorn, and Hahn were still aspirational; today they can only be admired.
