Flight of Fancy

by Maggie Osborne

Luke Bannister could go elsewhere with his infuriating charm and his knock-'em-dead good looks. Samantha Adams was not ripe for love. She was determined to make Adams Air Freight a success, and Bannister Air Freight was her competition. But after miraculously surviving a plane crash with Luke, Sam learned she was wrong. She had never known such glorious abandon, such ecstasy, as when they spent time in the mountain wilderness together — yet she also knew that once they were back in the real world, they would become adversaries again. Luke said he loved her, and wanted to marry her, but what was he really after: Samantha Adams or Adams Air?

192 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1984

About the author

aka
Margaret St. George

Maggie Osborne is the author of I Do, I Do, I Do and Silver Lining, as well as more than forty contemporary and historical romance novels written as Maggie Osborne and Margaret St. George. She has won numerous awards from Romantic Times, Affaire de Coeur, BookraK, the Colorado Romance Writers, and Coeur du Bois, among others. Osborne won the RITA for long historical from the Romance Writers of America in 1998. Maggie lives in a resort town in the Colorado mountains with her husband, one mule, two horses, one cat, and one dog, all of whom are a lot of aggravation, but she loves them anyway.

Reviews

[MLH · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't quite know how I ended up reading this book. I've loved the two other Maggie Osborne books I've read and I was looking for something short and stumbled across this and, well, here we are.

First I'll say it's not a bad book. Sam, the heroine, and Luke, the hero, are business competitors. They survive a plane crash, get stranded together on a mountain, and have to find a way to survive. Once they're rescued they have to figure out how to be together in the real world.

The problem with the book is that it is so dated. I hated the hero for sexually harassing the heroine at the business dinner that opens the story. Back in the early 1980's this would probably have come across as romantic to the reader, but I was seething. Then, towards the end, Sam has a talk with her fellow co-worker about marriage. Her friend tells her that she doesn't mind that her husband doesn't help out around the house or take care of some things because he's still a good man and he loves her. She points out that anyone that says marriage is 50/50 is full of it. I think that's probably still true today, but it's hard to read that a married couple is a team but the wife should smile about having to do more of the heavy lifting.

It such an antiquated notion that a woman's strength is in housekeeping and men just aren't good at those things. That being said, there is a strong feminist perspective in the book- Sam is trying to keep her air freight business going after her father has retired, but a lot of her clients are men and they don't seem to think a little lady is up for the challenge. Sam fights against that and is smart and working so hard. Luke of course is the charming white man who never thinks about details and just wants to fly. Things work out for him but there's never an awareness of his privilege. He does point out that he wants Sam to have her career and not just be a housewife, but after telling her that she can handle all the paperwork and business dealings, he also says that he'll make the kids so long as she keeps track of them.

I was wishing Samantha would bolt after he said that, but that's simply because I'm a product of my time. This is still well written and for a short book you definitely get caught up in the world. Maggie Osborne is a wonderful writer and it was interesting to see how far women's equality has come and also how much further it needs to go.

[ANGELIA · Rating 2 out of 5]

This wasn't bad, but the h had so many trust issues due to her crappy ex-fiancé, that she was afraid to trust the H because of them. It's so STUPID to let a crap person in your past influence your present/future, and sad to say, too many people do that in real life. I say, flush the memory of the crap person down the toilet, where all crap belongs, and look at other people in your life as individuals, don't taint them with what went on before, which has nothing to do with them.

It was nice to see the h having to do the groveling at the end, makes for a refreshing change. And I applaud a remark made by one of the characters, when she told the h that when it comes to relationships (marriage in particular) there has to be give and take and it can't always be 50/50 all the time. Unfortunately, too many people in real life don't remember this and expect marriage to be a hokey Hallmark move! Talk about BORING!!!! I'd much prefer real (and sometimes messy) life to those small-town YAWN Fests any day!