BEFORE FALCONS FLEW

From plantation fields to fighter cockpits

A plantation boy's dream of becoming a fighter pilot collides with love, loyalty, and the brutal realities of the jet age.

The author’s father, Gordon Ow

Maui, 1952.

Long before Hawaii became America's fiftieth state, Sam grows up in the plantation camps of Maui, where the Pacific War reaches into everyday life.

He lives under martial law. Soldiers and sailors fill the islands. Military aircraft cross the skies overhead.

Sam watches. And Sam dreams.

He wants to become a fighter pilot.

When a draft notice orders him into the Army during the Korean War, Sam fears his dream is over before it begins. Convinced he will be sent overseas as a ground soldier, he marries his high school sweetheart before reporting for duty.

Then, just before reporting for duty, Sam sees a different path.

Accepted into the Aviation Cadet Program, Sam is offered a chance to earn his wings and fly America's newest jet fighters. It is everything he has wanted since boyhood.

Until he learns one critical detail.

Cadets must remain unmarried until graduation.

To keep his place in the program, Sam must hide the existence of the woman he loves. Joined by Bruno, his childhood best friend, Sam enters a world of punishing training, fierce competition, and dangerous flying.

As the pressure mounts, ambition begins to test friendships, loyalties, and every bond he once believed was unbreakable.

Set against the backdrop of territorial Hawaii, the Korean War, and the dawn of the jet age, Before Falcons Flew is a story of ambition, friendship, love, sacrifice, and the extraordinary journey from plantation fields to fighter cockpits.

While the characters and story are fictional, the flight sequences draw inspiration from the real experiences of the author's father, who earned his wings during the Korean War and flew in the early years of the jet age.