First-time solo air trip,
not her first time on this flight route.
First airline hijackings by terrorists!
The author was aboard this hijacked flight as a teenager in 1970, when no one knew just how far the Palestinian fighters would go with their threats to blow up the planes and passengers.
Read an excerpt here as the age of terrorism begins with the first plane hijackings as political statement.
Girl on a Plane is being released in paperback today, or find it in hardcover at your local library or independent bookstore.
Cooperate or fight back?
**kmm
Book info: Girl on a Plane / Miriam Moss. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books for Young Readers, 2016 (hardcover), 2017 (paperback). [author site] [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.
My book talk: Flying back to boarding school from her father’s Army posting in Bahrain, Anna’s 1970 journey becomes a death watch as Palestinians hijack the BOAC plane headed for England!
At 15, Anna is old enough to fly on her own passport, young enough to be seated with other kids returning to school, routine travel for them all.
Suddenly, men in the cabin flourish guns, forcing the captain to fly far into the Jordanian desert where the Popular Front for Liberation of Palestine guerillas await.
Explosives are loaded onto the plane, food is not. With the engines off, their plane becomes a sweltering prison – Anna wonders if she, David, and young Tim with his pet turtle will ever get to school, will live to see another day…
Based on the author’s experiences as a teen, this gripping story is a glimpse into the tension-filled history of the Middle East and the passion of those who’d risk anything and everything for their cause.