The accidents discussed in this novel are based on actual ones. Crew fatigue, reduced training, inexperienced instructors, pilots becoming dependent on the aircraft’s automation, and airline mergers so the upper airline management can profit at the expense of the employees are all actual problems airline pilots face. The portrayal of some in the FAA wanting to do something about these problems but being prevented by their leaders is also accurately depicted.
Unfortunately I thought the author struggled to tie these subjects into a convincing thriller. The harassment the protagonist, Darby, experiences from her airline management I thought was a stretch for her alleged infractions. It wasn’t until the story was wrapped up did I understand why management had beleaguered her.
But the author making Darby out as a hardnosed woman who didn’t take any crap was smile invoking, and made the climax at the end realistic.
The other reason for my four star rating was the writing wasn’t as polished as I would have liked. There were a lot of stage directions to describe what was going on. Darby did this, then that, then she did this. The end was summed up in a narration I thought could have been more engaging if Darby had discussed the events with one of the other characters. Also, several events happened without any real setup or explanation as to how they came to be.
But the heart of the novel was so precisely depicted I admire Ms. Petitt’s ability to put the reader in the cockpit of an advance aircraft like the Airbus A-330 and fill the scene with enough details that the reader understands basically what is going on without bogging the story down with extraneous details.
I’ll be reading more of this author’s novels.
Dana Griffin 
Dana, Thank you for the professional review of Flight For Safety!!! I could not agree all the more on the polish of this work, and thus reason… I am here to tell all authors, “Despite demands, Aviation conferences, and all the reasons you needed the books yesterday, take the time, sacrifice the year and make it the best it can be.” Yet I am so glad you enjoyed journeying into the cockpit and becoming part of the action!
Karlene, I know all too well the pitfalls of publishing too early. My first novel, The Cover-Up, I rushed to publish, but have since gone back and republished correcting the errors. I wonder how many read that novel and decided not to read another because of my grammatical goofs or new writer mistakes?
Thank you for responding. I look forward to reading more of your books.
I wonder that myself. But my first book was better than my second. So perhaps that will help average to the third. Yes… to the foibles of new writers. Just keep pressing forward and improving is all we can do… and learn from our life lessons.