Customer Reviews

Phoenix Rising

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

John Nance has always impressed me whether in his written work or on T.V., etc... this book just helps prove that. You can tell that only an airline "insider" came up with this novel. He kept the right mix between the finincal part of things and the "down dirty" flying types of things. In the last third of the book is where it really gets exciting and keeps you on your seat till the end.

This book was an average Nance book, not bad, not good. I enjoyed many of the flight scenes, especially the 767 stuck above the Artic Circle, but the novel at some parts felt too much like an investigative novel, or a mystery. At the end, the novel seems to end abruptly. It was a dissapointing end, but if you are an aviation insider, it may provide a better read than an outsider would have.

From one pilot to another it is a good read. It is apparent that Nance is writing about "what he knows," even though the plane that was used has yet to be invented...Nance makes you believe it could happen.

I listened to the audiobook and my question is: "what factory makes the robot who read this book?

MY FAVORITE BOOK OF ALL TIME JUST WISH I COULD GET IT ON AUDIO CD!

A beautiful financial whiz gets more than she bargained for when she agrees to help bring Pan Am back from airline oblivion. (the real Pan Am had just gone under when this book appeared, and hardcore aviation enthusiasts were finding it hard to let go). The new Pan Am has a novel idea - fewer passengers per flight, leaving more room for lounges. Unfortunately, the idea is a dangerous one (more on that), and somebody has now set their sights on grounding PA for good. A series of elaborate accidents - so effective that heroic and quick-thinking piloting just barely save the day - plague PA planes in the air. On the ground, the mysterious conspiracy works to undercut PA's financing, requiring equally heroic and quick-thinking accounting methods. Will PA survive?

Will anybody care? "Phoenix Rising" is the typical example of a book that tries to come off as gripping and edge of your seat even as its prose and marketing are aimed comfortably within a well-established market (the market for readers who cares about an airline being named Pan Am; readers who know that there is a "big three" of US airlines; readers who care about the inner workings of aircraft financing). The premise itself has a big hole in it - why would somebody care enough about Pan Am to ground it? The heroine's explanation is utterly illogical: because it would prove you could fly planes with fewer passengers and with greater amenities and still turn a profit. Forgetting that that's pure wish fulfillment, were it true, the other airlines could just copy Pan Am's idea and profit just as easily as Pan Am. (Because the other airlines' position couldn't be as precarious as Pan Am's, they'd be even better positioned to profit from the idea than Pan Am, so the idea is simply illogical). The mysterious conspirators could also simply buy Pan Am outright. What really kills the book is...who cares? This isn't a book about a horrible air crash ("Final Approach") or some doomsday weapon ("Medusa's Child"). This is a book about airplanes flying with sleeper seats and treadmills - hardly earthshaking, and not worth anybody's time.

If "Phoenix Rising" was meant to be the "Airport of the 90s", it certainly had me fooled, and not because "Airport" wasn't all that great to begin with. The story plunders on with all the predictability, and none of the speed, of a commuter flight. Smattered through this road are references to boring theories and references from Nance's past books, such as "deregulation was a disaster", Braniff Airlines, poor Pan Am, etc. Only late in the story does Nance fill in all the details of the obvious big picture, by introducing a host of characters and corporations (most of them shadowy foreigners) that force the puzzled reader to endlessly turn back for past references or clues that don't exist.

The most shocking plot twist I could find in the novel came from one of the planes that fall victim to the haplessly unsuccessful saboteurs. Without giving away the plot, I can only say this - given that Nance, a thirty-year veteran of aviation, can make a 767 take off at ground temperatures below -50F after sitting for hours, why are we always held up at airports in the winter while our planes are deiced?

Even more worrisome is the flaw in the general premise of the story - if an airline's security is so poor that an individual (however backed by others) can walk into their jets and sabotage them at will, practically on a weekly basis, who really wants them to shake the conspiracy and get back to full service? Outside of a few terrorist organizations, I can't think of any takers.

Airplanes get de-icing treatment when there is a risk of icing. Not simply because it's cold.

At cruising altitude the temperature is colder than 50 degrees below zero. Is every flight de-iced? No.

As a commercial pilot, maybe the author knows more than you think.