Falcons of France is a novel which relates some of the truest and most vivid experiences that ever befell youth—the story of the Lafayette Flying Corps as told by two of its noted members.
To Charlie Selden, on his father's ranch in California, war seems a wonderful adventure—and he frets because he may miss it. An opportunity comes for him to join the Lafayette Flying Corps, which has been built up from the Escadrille Lafayette, composed of fifteen men, to a corps comprising an organization of about one hundred.
On the way to Paris he meets a wealthy young American whose objective is the same as his, and they become firm friends. From the early days of the ground school to the solo flights which brought their graduation and their release for active duty at the Front, we watch the realization slowly growing upon them that they have embarked on something more than a lark, as the grimness and horror of this business of war becomes impressed upon them.
The reader follows the fortunes of a group of young men made famous by such names as Lufbery, Victor Chapman, Bill Thaw, and Norman Prince, through the dreamy days of the Lorraine Patrol of Verdun and the desperate flying in the dark spring of 1918, from the banter of the mess to the rigor of German prison camps.
There is no need of fiction; here is the true narrative of a life of great daring, of mingled gayety, exaltation, and sorrow. To read it is to share again in that spirit the memory of which is one of our most precious souvenirs of the War.
—from the dust jacket
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