The Flight Attendant.

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                     CONTAINS SPOILERS

Cassandra Bowden is no stranger to hungover mornings. She's a binge drinker, her job with the airline making it easy to find adventure, and the occasional blackouts seem to be inevitable. She lives with them, and the accompanying self-loathing. 

When she awakes in a Dubai hotel room, she tries to piece the previous night back together, already counting the minutes until she has to catch her crew shuttle to the airport. She quietly slides out of bed, careful not to aggravate her already pounding head, and looks at the man she spent the night with. She sees his dark hair. His utter stillness. And blood, a slick, still wet pool on the crisp white sheets. Afraid to call the police—she's a single woman alone in a hotel room far from home—Cassie begins to lie. She lies as she joins the other flight attendants and pilots in the van. She lies on the way to Paris as she works the first class cabin. She lies to the FBI agents in New York who meet her at the gate. 

Soon it's too late to come clean—or face the truth about what really happened back in Dubai. Could she have killed him? If not, who did? 

 

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 Suspenseful. Enthralling. 

I didn’t hear about The Flight Attendant up until I saw the preview for the show online. Not long after, I heard that it was based on the book. The show preview looked very mysterious and the type of story that I love. When I was in Virginia, visiting my friends, a best friend of mine and I went to a bookstore, and when I saw the book, I ended up getting a copy. I wasn’t sure if I would like the book, I haven’t read anything by the author before. I decided to take a chance. Have you come across the book when you started to read it? You wished that you came across it sooner? That’s how I felt few minutes after starting to read The Flight Attendant, which drew me in from the first sentence. In that first sentence, you will wonder what will happen, and most of all, you will wonder the reason behind Alex’s murder. This book rose beyond my exceptions. 

I didn’t know what to think about Cassie. She wasn’t a character that you could quickly like. On the other hand, you do feel sorry for what she had to endure after the murder. You would think that after an experience like that, she would give up on drinking. If you get to the point where you blackout from drinking, that is never a good sight. I wonder if that would be a sign that she should give up drinking. Except the opposite happens. With the choices that she makes and the lies, I felt that the FBI would figure out that something is not right at some point. I think Cassie get herself in more trouble, and she wouldn’t even listen to the advice that her lawyer was giving her. I couldn’t figure out how I felt about the character, but I hoped that she realizes that her drinking is a problem. I wondered if anything more would happen between Alex and Cassie if he weren’t killed if the two of them would see each other again at some point. 

There were some slow parts in the book. Elena, I enjoyed reading few parts of her story, but to me, it wasn’t as interesting as Cassie’s. In general, it was one of the best murder mystery books that I have read in a while. My favorites were the details in The Flight Attendant and the description of everything that was happening, including the ongoing investigation. I thought as I was there along with everyone. I loved the interviews that were posted through the book. The Flight Attendant is not a book that can be easily put down. I read the book within three days because I spent hours reading, wanting to see how it ends. The Flight Attendant might have been my first book by Chris Bohjalian, but it won’t be my last. Now that I have read the book, I’m excited for the chance to check the show.