Grounded

by Emma Henderson

There was something else in the air that night which made us feel that the flight we had just operated was somehow significant.

Whether it was anticipation of our impending doom or just a realisation that a tidal wave was rushing towards us and we were trapped on the beach, unable to escape its inevitability, I will never know, but ultimately, although I did not know it at the time, this was a very significant flight for me because it turned out to be the last flight in eleven years at my airline, in a career spanning more than thirty years and five different bases.

The fact that there are still fewer than 500 female airline captains in the world today is part of the reason that I wanted to tell my story.

I have a voice, it is my responsibility to use it to benefit other people, I may be grounded, at the moment, but this isn't necessarily the end of my flying story, it never is when you fly, because flying is not something you do, flying is something you are.

"...how to face your fears, how to lead, how to deal with failure, and above all how to do it with humour and class. Devour it and learn from it!"

Sarah Furness - Best Selling author, internationally renowned speaker, former combat helicopter pilot

"Emma's journey will resonate with so many in and outside of the airline industry... A brilliant read."

Mandy Hickson - First woman to fly the Tornado GR4 on the front line, leading TedX speaker and bestselling author

272 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 22, 2024

About the author

Emma Henderson went to school in London and studied at Somerville College, Oxford and Yale University. She wrote blurbs for Penguin Books for two years, then spent a decade teaching English in comprehensive schools and further education colleges, before moving to the French Alps where, for six years, she ran a ski and snowboard lodge. She now lives in Derbyshire and is a lecturer in English and Creative Writing at Keele University. Emma Henderson’s debut novel, Grace Williams Says It Loud, was published in 2010. It won the McKitterick Prize and was shortlisted for the Orange Prize, the Commonwealth Writers’ First Book Award, the Authors’ Club First Novel Award, the Wellcome Book Prize and was runner-up for the Mind Book of the Year. Her second novel, published in April 2017, The Valentine House, has its roots in a remote valley in the French Alps, where she lived for six years. The Times says it is “beautifully written” and the Daily Mail describes it as “gripping and poignant.”