it was immediately seized on by both men and women as representing the new feminist consciousness of women’s liberation. The reviews indicated that some readers were shocked by the candidly sexual language and by the novel’s protagonist, who insists on describing sexual fantasies and sexual experience from a women’s point of view and who does not apologize for an insistence on her right to sexual pleasure. On the other hand, feminist reviewers represented many women readers in applauding a fictional heroine who was creative and intellectual but also highly sexual. Men also welcomed the novel, indicating that they learned much about women’s sexual feelings from the book. The ultimate message in the novel about female sexuality is that it is not so different from male sexuality. The novel’s impact is suggested by the fact that it was a best-seller, with three million copies sold in the first year.

Many women related to Isadora’s difficult struggle to stand on her own. For many years, women had been conditioned to defer to men and to value their roles as sweethearts and wives above all others. Isadora is like the typical woman in that she had a tendency to fawn over men, but she is also an accomplished and creative person in her own right—a poet—and her identity as an individual and a writer becomes increasingly important to her in the course of the novel. Isadora also recounts her search for female artistic role models. She says that, lacking such models, she had to learn about women from D. H. Lawrence, a twentieth century British novelist who wrote about female sexuality. Fear of Flying made an important statement about women’s newly discovered desire for female role models and literary “foremothers.”

Fear of Flying is more intricately structured than it initially seems. The story starts with Isadora traveling to Vienna with her husband to attend a psychoanalytic conference. Since Vienna is associated with Freud and is attempting to overlook its Nazi history by welcoming numerous Jewish psychoanalysts, it serves as a fitting backdrop for Isadora to delve into her personal anxieties, family background, Jewish identity, and Freud's question: "What do women want?"

She investigates these themes through a series of flashbacks arranged by theme rather than in chronological order. Because these flashbacks are elaborated with detailed and often humorous portrayals, the novel is sometimes labeled as picaresque: a satirical and realistic series of adventures connected only by a central character. However, Isadora's journey is guided by the quest motif, and the novel is further enhanced with rich allusions, imagery, and symbolism.

The publication of Fear of Flying in 1973 represents a pivotal moment in the initial phase of the modern feminist movement, characterized by awareness, rebellion, and anger. Erica Jong articulated feelings and perspectives that women had hesitated to express, even in their private thoughts. Among the "forbidden" subjects were erotic fantasies, masturbation, menstruation, and society's pressure for women to alter, shave, perfume, and ultimately reject their natural bodies. Many critics of the era described the book's stance toward men with the simplistic label "man-hating." However, this term fails to capture its complexity. The novel includes elements of mockery, disdain, anger, pity, and sorrow, which can be best described as irreverence: once traditional beliefs are abandoned, it often seems as if the emperor is exposed. As a result, the book echoed the widespread questioning of ideals and institutions during the political upheavals of the late 1960s and early 1970s.

While pursuing her doctorate at Columbia University, Jong focused on eighteenth-century literature. The most evident influence on the book's structure and tone—particularly the bawdy humor that both reveals and shields against harsh realities—can be traced to works like Henry Fielding's Tom Jones. In terms of more contemporary novels, critics frequently described Fear of Flying as a female counterpart to Philip Roth's Portnoy's Complaint (1969) or drew parallels with J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye (1951).

Several novels with comparable themes were released around the same time as Fear of Flying. These include Sue Kaufman's The Diary of a Mad Housewife (1967), Dorothy Bryant's Ella Price's Journal (1972), Anne Roiphe's Up the Sandbox (1972), and Marge Piercy's Small Changes (1973). Each of these works explores, at least partially, the journey of self-discovery undertaken by a woman who is already married and ostensibly "happy." Among these, Jong's novel stood out for its effective use of humor as a tool, although it lacked the warmth or resolution often found in other feminist perspectives.

Jong continued the story of Isadora Wing in How to Save Your Own Life (1977) and Parachutes and Kisses (1984). However, neither book achieved the same level of success as the first. This was partly because, while maintaining its semi-autobiographical nature, Isadora Wing is depicted as the author of a hugely successful erotic novel. A central theme explores how public success impacts private life. These books are less humorous, less bawdy, less exaggerated, and less relatable to a universal audience. In How to Save Your Own Life, when Isadora Wing negotiates million-dollar deals with Hollywood agents, or in Parachutes and Kisses, when she navigates single motherhood in a lavish fourteen-room house complete with a Mercedes and a nanny, the novels offer the allure of a roman à clef. They are often read for the biographical gossip about Erica Jong rather than as a medium for expressing universal female fantasies and frustrations.