The First Air War: 1914-1918 Book

This book isn't really an operational history of air operations in World War One, nor does it offer biographical sketches of any of the major aces. It doesn't even mention aces like Rene Fonck or Werner Voss. Nor is there much technical information on the airplanes themselves; I don't recall seeing a single mention of the Fokker D.VII, or the SE-5A.

But it's still a good book. In a handful of chapters, it offers a kind of sociology of aviators, a theory about why the British were so much more offensive-minded in the air than anyone else, the growth of scattered squadrons into autonomous air arms, and it also discusses the weird disconnect between what people thought airpower could do, and what it actually did (namely, that artillery spotting and reconnaissance were airpower's main contributions, and that bombing and ground attack didn't really add up to much.

If you want to read about aces, dogfights, airplanes, campaigns, or kill statistics, this may not be for you. But if you're interested in the thinking and demographics of fighter pilots, and the formation of air arms in general, it's worth a read.