Surprisingly informational for a fluff piece of easy reading. Sounds like a backhanded compliment but I mean it in a positive way. Unfortunately almost half of it is incoherent ramblings that may fit on a blog but not in a book (like an in depth discussion of author's opinions of logos). ( )

Great read about airplanes and flying... explained (mostly) in words even everyday readers can understand! ( )

Patrick Smith is an airline pilot and therefore knows a thing or two about air travel. In this book, he provides clear, realistic answers to common questions about how planes work, what makes pilots tick, why air travel is so frustrating, and more. The realistic answers are what I like best: when there’s no easy answer to a question, he says so and explains why. I also enjoy his humour, particularly when describing his own experiences in his early days of pilothood. I’d recommend this book if you’re interested in aviation from the perspective of a pilot. ( )

Absorbing, informative, quirky and hugely entertaining warts & all expose of the airline industry. Smith is a celebrated blogger with a long experience of both the glamourous and decidedly less glamourous sides of the aviation industry, and he answers all the questions that nervous or curious fliers have always wanted to ask, and along the way kills forever the notion that being an airline pilot is a romantic occupation. Long hours, hard work, long separations from home and family and, particularly in the brutally cut-throat regional airline sector, miserably low pay. He throws in anecdotes from his own career to illustrate both the excitement and the banality of flight, exposes the secrets of air travel (what do airport abbreviations actually mean, can you still visit the cockpit (yes, you can, at least while the plane is still on the ground), what does "disarm cabin doors and cross-check" mean, what do pilots carry in their bags and so on. He also unleashes on his pet peeves, most notably the time-wasting airport security since 9/11, which he contends is mostly useless anyway. He also broaches the subject of airplane safety, solemnly listing the worst air accidents in history (more than 2500 lives lost in 10 crashes), and devotes a special mention to the worst of all, the Tenerife crash in 1977 which killed 583. He also rates the world's airlines on their service, and somewhat more humourously, on the attractiveness or otherwise of their livery. Fascinating, informative and useful book. ( )

Best for: People who like trivia; nervous fliers.

In a nutshell: Pilot answers common questions and provides fun anecdotes about commercial air travel.

Line that sticks with me: “To a degree, each of these is open to interpretation, but there are four standard cabins: first class, business class, economy class, and Ryanair.”

Why I chose it: Airport purchase

Review: This was a mostly fun and interesting read. It starts strong, has some lags in the middle, has interesting bits 3/4 the way through, and ends one a bit of a meh. Mr. Smith covers so many topics, and I can’t think of any that he left out that I was wondering about. He talks about safety, about what’s happening at different points throughout the flights, and what we should really be fearing.

He doesn’t hide the fact that plane crashes happen, and he has a refreshing perspective of what September 11 did to the airline industry, especially where security is concerned. He also takes on some things I didn’t know I was interested in learning about, like his thoughts on airplane paint jobs (but they are kind of fun to read).

At 280 pages, this book might seem long, but it’s a fairly quick read. It’s three stars for me because it is well-written and interesting, but could use with some stronger editing.

(You can check out his website for updated information; he has already weighed in on the United passenger removal issue here: http://www.askthepilot.com/passenger-forcibly-removed/) ( )