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Episode Description

New York Times Bestseller will drop in with us to talk about the making of “Fly Girl” An entertaining and fascinating memoir of “gifted storyteller” (People) Ann Hood’s adventurous years as a TWA flight attendant named one of Spring 2022’s “Most Anticipated Books” by Apple Books In 1978, in the tailwind of the Golden Age of air travel, flight attendants were the epitome of glamor and sophistication.  Fresh out of college and hungry to experience the world, Ann Hood joined their ranks.  She carved chateaubriand in the first-class cabin, found romance on layovers in London and Lisbon, and walked more than a million miles in high heels, smiling as she served thousands of passengers.  She flew through the start of deregulation, an oil crisis, massive furloughs, and a labor strike.  As the airline industry changed around her, Hood began to write—even drafting snatches of her first novel from the jump-seat.  She reveals how the job empowered her, despite its roots in sexist standards.  Packed with funny, moving, and shocking stories of life as a flight attendant, Fly Girl captures the nostalgia and magic of air travel at its height, and the thrill that remains with every takeoff.  Flying into a bookstore near you on May 3rd, 2022!  Pick up a copy and learn from a master how it’s done.  Ann will speak about publishing her memoir, revisiting memories, and how the airline industry changed not just itself, but her, into a self-confident, uber competent woman during the 1970’s and to this day, informs her writing, her book tours and herself.

In Ann’s words: I have wanted to be a writer for as long as I remember.  My favorite books when I was a kid were Little Women and Nancy Drew.  Later, I loved Marjorie Morningstar, Les Miserables and Doctor Zhivago, obviously choosing books by size!  A Rhode Island native, I was born in West Warwick and spent high school working as a Marsha Jordan Girl, modeling for the Jordan Marsh department store at the Warwick Mall.  I majored in English at the University of Rhode Island, and that’s where I fell in love with Shakespeare, Willa Cather, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. When I was in seventh grade, I read a book called How To Become An Airline Stewardess that fueled my desire to see the world.  And that’s just what I did when I graduated from URI–I went to work for TWA as a flight attendant.  Back then, I thought you needed adventures in order to be a writer.  Of course, I know now that all you need, as Eudora Welty said, is to sit on your own front porch.  But I did see a lot of the world with TWA, moved from Boston to St. Louis and finally to NYC, a place I’d dreamed of living… I wrote my first novel, Somewhere Off the Coast of Maine, on international flights and on the Train to the Plane, which was the subway out to JFK.  It was published in 1987.  Since then, I’ve published in The New York Times, The Paris Review, O, Bon Appetit, Tin House, The Atlantic Monthly, Real Simple, and other wonderful places; I’ve won two Pushcart Prizes, Best American Food Writing Awards and many others.

Ann Hood

In Ann’s words: I have wanted to be a writer for as long as I remember. My favorite books when I was a kid were Little Women and Nancy Drew. Later, I loved Marjorie Morningstar, Les Miserables and Doctor Zhivago, obviously choosing books by size! A Rhode Island native, I was born in West Warwick and spent high school working as a Marsha Jordan Girl, modeling for the Jordan Marsh department store at the Warwick Mall. I majored in English at the University of Rhode Island, and that’s where I fell in love with Shakespeare, Willa Cather, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. When I was in seventh grade, I read a book called How To Become An Airline Stewardess that fueled my desire to see the world. And that’s just what I did when I graduated from URI–I went to work for TWA as a flight attendant. Back then, I thought you needed adventures in order to be a writer. Of course, I know now that all you need, as Eudora Welty said, is to sit on your own front porch. But I did see a lot of the world with TWA, moved from Boston to St. Louis and finally to NYC, a place I’d dreamed of living… I wrote my first novel, Somewhere Off the Coast of Maine, on international flights and on the Train to the Plane, which was the subway out to JFK. It was published in 1987. Since then, I’ve published in The New York Times, The Paris Review, O, Bon Appetit, Tin House, The Atlantic Monthly, Real Simple, and other wonderful places; I’ve won two Pushcart Prizes, Best American Food Writing Awards and many others.