Book excerpt: INSIDE THE TURN CIRCLE relates the challenges and joys of training for and becoming an F-16 fighter pilot in the U.S. Air Force from 1979 to 1988. It reflects both life in the air and on the ground, including: the culture of the fighter squadron the joys and challenges of living overseas the fun adventures and love shared by families depending on each other the stresses and pressures inherent in this often dangerous profession U.S. Air Force Colonel (Ret) P.K. White provides an inside look into the life of a fighter pilot during the Cold War. This is a story of laughter and tears, triumphs and defeats, overcoming challenges, and the exhilaration of flying America's front-line fighter jets. Colonel White tells the story of growing up on military bases in Europe as the son of an Air Force Chief Master Sergeant in the turbulent Sixties and Seventies, attending college through the Air Force ROTC program, then heading off to pilot training as a Second Lieutenant. He explains what it was like facing off against the Warsaw Pact flying the Air Force's hottest fighter, the F-16 Fighting Falcon, in Germany in the Eighties when the Soviet Union was a real and present threat.