No high-flown adventure with Saint-Exupéry, and no more sincere than a flight attendant's “B’bye!” at the destination’s...
A flight attendant’s lighter-than-air view of his job and the crackpot customers for whom he cares. Mild-mannered, balding, big, and male in a heavily female workforce, Hester casts a jaundiced eye on human nature as it manifests itself squeezed into a metal tube and fed on questionable food with toy utensils. He takes off with descriptions of barf, then the really high adventure proceeds with tales of airborne vermin and other forms of animal life as well as brawling passengers and still other forms of animal life. There are attempted infiltrations from steerage to first class (it won’t work), semi-nude passengers, and baby bottles filled with Classic Coke and sugar. Our attendant alerts us to layover shenanigans, bossy captains, addled cockpit and cabin crews, equipment failures, inadequate overhead bins, turbulence, and, naturally, air rage. Along with the toilet humor is a lot of chatty single-entendre about sex. And all with explicit adverbs, daring adjectives, and extravagant similes—yet it’s no more offensive than a “yours-to-take-home” in-flight magazine. Newspaper clippings are provided to lend credence to the yarns.
No high-flown adventure with Saint-Exupéry, and no more sincere than a flight attendant's “B’bye!” at the destination’s jetway, but it’ll probably meet its modest aim of making the trip to O’Hare just fly. (7 b&w illustrations)Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-312-26958-7
Page Count: 256
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2001
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
