Fired Flight Attendant's Novel
Diary of a Dysfunctional Flight Attendant: The Queen of Sky Blog
Ellen Simonetti is internationally known as the flight attendant fired for blogging. Her debut novel mirrors her personal blogging journey but with a twist.
There's a new quirky singleton in town and her name is Elena Guaio. High-tech voyeuristic blogging meets the publishing world in Ellen Simonetti's debut novel, Diary of a Dysfunctional Flight Attendant: The Queen of Sky Blog. This is the world's first novel in blog format and is based on Simonetti's 2004 personal story of a flight attendant fired for blogging.
The book begins in January with protagonist Elena, a U.S.-based flight attendant, coping with her mother's recent death through blogging. She dubs herself the "Queen of Sky" and over the next nine months the blog becomes her confidant. As Elena becomes comfortable blogging, her entries become more candid, politically incorrect and passionate. She blogs about affairs between flight attendants and pilots, what flight attendants really think of cranky passengers and the entertaining things flight crews do during layovers. All the while, she keeps confidential her airline's name, base airport and co-workers' names.
Through the months, Queen of Sky gradually reveals her fun-loving self and offers insight into the gritty life of a flight attendant and challenges of being a tall, twenty-something, single woman. She finds love during her international layovers, especially in food. In mouthwatering detail, Elena describes tasty culinary delights in destinations like Lima, Madrid and Rome.
She dabbles in online dating but the affairs with too-good-to-be-true men don't last. And that's alright with her, because Queen of Sky is a self-confident, independent woman with adoring quirkiness (She admits to sniffing her shoes to find the least smelly pair).
Eventually, Elena posts photos of herself and co-workers on her blog. The images are silly: one is a flight attendant stretched out in an airplane's over-head-bin while another shows Elena sitting in the first class cabin munching on a slice of pizza. While Diary of a Dysfunctional Flight Attendant is a work of fiction, photos from the author's blog are included but the images have been altered to protect the anonymity of her non-fictional co-workers.
The goofy photos set in motion a turbulent journey for Elena, raising issues of gender inequality and freedom of speech at Anonymous Airlines. Events move swiftly over a couple of months leading to an empowering finale for the Queen of Sky at the end of the year.
Frequent fliers, wannabe flight attendants and curious voyeurs will appreciate the bumpy ride of Diary of a Dysfunctional Flight Attendant: The Queen of Sky Blog. Although this novel is closely based on Simonetti's blog, "Diary of a Fired Flight Attendant," readers need to remember it is a work of fiction.
