Newman is a former flight attendant who uses her background in aviation to carve out a niche within the survival/thriller genre. In 2011, she followed in the footsteps of her mother and sister and became a flight attendant; she worked at Virgin America and Alaska Airlines and often sketched out her stories during overnight flights. The idea for her first novel, Falling, came during one such flight: She envisioned a dilemma in which terrorists hold a pilot’s wife and children hostage and tell him that he must crash the plane or else his family will be killed.

Both Falling and Drowning shed light on the realities of working on a plane. As both novels highlight, the service aspects of the role are secondary; the primary focus of all flight staff, from the pilot to the flight attendants, is ensuring the safety of everyone on board. Drowning provides a glimpse into airline emergency procedures and the staff who are trained to remain calm and professional in the face of danger. Among the people trapped on board are three members of the flight’s crew: Kit, the pilot, and two flight attendants, Molly and Kaholo.