In Formation: One Woman's Rise Through the Ranks of the U.S. Air Force

A first-hand account of one woman's Air Force career—the barriers she broke and the challenges she faced in twenty years of military service.

When Cheryl Dietrich joined the US Air Force, she began a transformation from overweight introvert and military neophyte into one of the key personnel redesigning the structure of the Air Force within the Pentagon. In this stirring and revelatory memoir, Cheryl—one of only a hundred female officers of colonel rank or higher—explains what it takes to stay the course, overcome male domination issues, break the glass ceiling more than once, and deal with the political issues facing the Pentagon.

In Formation also covers the day-to-day life of an enlisted woman and subjects specific to the military: what it's like to be a squadron commander; to lead a NATO division, mobility exercises, and wartime exercises in gas mask and chem gear; and to deploy with NATO to war-torn Croatia. From the mundane to the heroic, this is a story about finding within oneself the kernels of courage that define the warrior—female or male.