Julia Cooke – författare

Glamour, danger, liberation: in a Mad Menera ofcommercial flight, Pan AmWorldAirways attractedthekind of young woman who wanted out, and wanted up Required to have a college education, speak two languages, and possessthepolitical savvy of a Foreign Service officer,ajet-age stewardessserving on iconic Pan Am between 1966 and 1975 also had to be between 53 and 59, between 105 and 140 pounds, and under 26 years of ageatthetime of hire.Cooke's intimate storytelling weaves togetherthereal-life stories of a memorable cast of characters, from small-town girl Lynne Totten, a science major who decided life in a lab was not for her, to Hazel Bowie, one oftherelatively few Black stewardesses oftheera, asthey embracedtheliberation oftheir new jet-set life. Cooke brings to lightthestory of Pan Am stewardesses' role intheVietnam War, astheairline added runs from Saigon to Hong Kong for planeloads of weary young soldiers straight fromthebattlefields, who were off for five days of R&R, andthen flownback to war. Finally, with Operation Babyliftthedramatic evacuation of 2,000 children duringthefall of Saigonthebook's special cast of stewardesses unites to play an extraordinary role ontheworldstage.

Glamour, danger, liberation: in a Mad Men–era of commercial flight, Pan Am World Airways attracted the kind of young woman who wanted out, and wanted up Required to have a college education, speak two languages, and possess the political savvy of a Foreign Service officer, a jet-age stewardess serving on iconic Pan Am between 1966 and 1975 also had to be between 5′3" and 5′9", between 105 and 140 pounds, and under 26 years of age at the time of hire.Cooke’s intimate storytelling weaves together the real-life stories of a memorable cast of characters, from small-town girl Lynne Totten, a science major who decided life in a lab was not for her, to Hazel Bowie, one of the relatively few Black stewardesses of the era, as they embraced the liberation of their new jet-set life. Cooke brings to light the story of Pan Am stewardesses’ role in the Vietnam War, as the airline added runs from Saigon to Hong Kong for planeloads of weary young soldiers straight from the battlefields, who were off for five days of R&R, and then flown back to war. Finally, with Operation Babylift—the dramatic evacuation of 2,000 children during the fall of Saigon—the book’s special cast of stewardesses unites to play an extraordinary role on the world stage.

Rebecca West, Emily “Mickey” Hahn, Martha Gellhorn. Congo, the American South, Cuba, the lively salons of Shanghai, Yugoslavia on the brink of World War II, the shot-riddled streets of Spain, Hong Kong under Japanese occupation, Germany and Italy at war, post-Blitz London, McCarthy-era Mexico, and beyond. These women didn’t just bear witness to the great changes of the twentieth century, they didn’t just write the backstory to wars that roused their readers to support, they transformed the very world they were describing, and the way it was understood.Each writer traversed the globe, searching for stories they would then dispatch to The New Yorker, The Times (London), The New York Times, The New Republic, The Atlantic Monthly, Collier’s, and Vogue. They often traveled alone, sometimes teaming up with other women reporters, sometimes with their husbands along for the ride. They sneaked onto the front lines when they were forbidden, interviewed civilians to gather color and detail. They wrote novels to pay the bills and articles to explain the world to itself. Over the course of their intertwining lives, they became mothers and friends, took joy in each other’s successes.Julia Cooke's Starry and Restless is the story of three women whose curiosity, grit, and ambition expanded the possibilities for women and meaningful work.

Change looms in Havana, Cuba's capital, a city electric with uncertainty yet cloaked in cliché, 90 miles from U.S. shores and off-limits to most Americans. Journalist Julia Cooke, who lived there at intervals over a period of five years, discovered a dynamic scene: baby-faced anarchists with Mohawks gelled with laundry soap, whiskey-drinking children of the elite, Santería trainees, pregnant prostitutes, university graduates planning to leave for the first country that will give them a visa. This last generation of Cubans raised under Fidel Castro animate life in a waning era of political stagnation as the rest of the world beckons: waiting out storms at rummy hurricane parties and attending raucous drag cabarets, planning ascendant music careers and black-market business ventures, trying to reconcile the undefined future with the urgent today.Eye-opening and politically prescient, The Other Side of Paradise offers a deep new understanding of a place that has so confounded and intrigued us.

** Chosen as a May 2021 pick for The Fearless Book Club by Nobel Peace Prize-Winner, Malala Yousafzai **Travel writer Julia Cooke's exhilarating portrait of Pan Am stewardesses in the Mad Men era.Glamour, danger, liberation: in the Jet Age, Pan Am offered young women the world. Come Fly the World tells the story of the stewardesses who served on the iconic Pan American Airways between 1966 and 1975 - and of the unseen diplomatic role they played on the world stage.Alongside the glamour was real danger, as they flew soldiers to and from Vietnam and staffed Operation Babylift - the dramatic evacuation of 2,000 children during the fall of Saigon. Cooke's storytelling weaves together the true stories of women like Lynne Totten, a science major who decided life in a lab was not for her, to Hazel Bowie, one of the relatively few African American stewardesses of the era, as they embraced the liberation of a jet-set life.In the process, Cooke shows how the sexualized coffee-tea-or-me stereotype was at odds with the importance of what they did, and with the freedom, power and sisterhood they achieved.