Flight was already at the top of our list of books to read. Then we read the New York Times review of it this past Sunday and felt a new urgency to go out and buy it. The review was beautifully written, sincere, and completely lacking the typical elitist jargon one usually finds while reading reviews of books in well-known papers. And so on our flight back to San Francisco we read Flight in one sitting, ignoring our need to go to the lavatory and the old smelly man in front of us reclining his seat into our lap. Sherman Alexie hates flying. And we fully recognized the irony in reading a book written by him called Flight on a six-hour plane ride. Last time we saw Alexie read at Modern Times for his short story collection, The Lone Ranger & Tonto Fistfight in Heaven he told the crowd how he was terrified of planes, and convinced he was going to die on one. He also talked at length about how much he hates backpack wearing people in small places, like planes and buses, and we sort of fell in love with him after that. more ›