What's the Name of That Book??? discussion
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The Magician's Assistant
SOLVED: Adult Fiction
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SOLVED. Hilarious flight in snowstorm [s]
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Gibner
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Dec 21, 2014 04:42AM
Very sorry folks but I read this novel (or short story?) a couple years ago and for once didn't write the title down. I had at the time a terrible fear of flying - since sorted out - and remember nearly wetting myself laughing so much at this one scene: a woman is on a late-night midwinter flight in middle America somewhere and the small plane is landing in a snowstorm. The two female passengers - total strangers - hold hands across the aisle as they wobble alarmingly to the runway, while the stewardess alternately prays loudly and screams from behind the curtain. Someone utters a line to the effect "well honey it's always the SMALL ones that crash!". I have a feeling said passenger was on her way to meet up with family and not looking forward to the visit, and the hair-raising flight was an omen of worse to come. It might have been an LGBT novel, as I was reading a lot of that at the time. Pretty sure it was a US author. Any help? And Merry Christmas!
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Was it Adult fiction? YA? Do you remember the cover? Was it written in first-person narrative?
It certainly wasn't "adult fiction" if you mean erotica ... no definitely not! It may have been LGBT as I was reading a lot of Edmund White and David Leavitt at the time but I don't think it was either of them, but when I say "LGBT" that's the author and the "G" bit would have been a gay male character in the story, in other words the female passenger herself was not gay but a friend of someone who was. Sadly no recall on the cover. Not first-person, 99% sure it was third-person. Sorry I know that's not much to go on but it was certainly a memorable scene, alarming and funny at the same time, and I'm hoping someone else out there recalls it. If I didn't know better I'd have said it was Armistead Maupin except I'm familiar with almost every word he's written and it isn't his work. The novel had a serious tone to it, and this was a rare humorous moment. I'll be chipping in myself on this discussion board whenever I can help out!
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[blush] Newbie naïveté, very sorry. So, this is therfore definitely adult fiction. My living-room floor is a mess this morning because I was up to midnight last night pulling out books trying to find this blessed passage. I realised the LGBT thing might be a complete red herring as I was also reading a lot of crime fiction at the time. The protagonist is definitely female, the story about the hairy flight in a snowstorm is told in the third person, but more than that is a blank. I can't remember why the protagonist was heading into the midwest on a small plane and landing on an icy tarmac but she was. Argh! I'm hoping someone else out there read this and laughed as much as I did thus lodging it in their memories (along with the title and author he says).
GOTTIT! Ann Patchett's novel "The Magician's Assistant", the chapter about a third of the way in entitled "Nebraska". Found it today in a local secondhand bookstore and as soon as I saw the cover all the bits fell into place. Thanks for trying guys.
Good, cuz i wanna read this one!
Enjoy! Was right that there is an LGBT ppart of the storyline though it isn't the only ingredient. It isn't a comic novel, this is a rare funny moment (if like me you have a dark sense of humour). Was wrong about the praying but right about most of the other stuff. Merry Christmas!
