Robert Mason was born in Plainfield, NJ in March 1942 and moved to DelRay Beach, FL as a small child. He grew upon a chicken farm, dreaming of flying, earned his fixed wing pilot's license in high school, dropped out of the University of Florida after two years and joined the Army to learn to fly helicopters. He spent a 1965-66 in Vietnam flying a Huey slick in B, 229, 1st Cav and the 48th Aviation Co. He wrote his best selling memoir, Chickenhawk, seventeen years later. Weapon, a novel about a military robot who wouldn't obey orders followed, then Chickenhawk: Back in the World, about the difficulties he faced after the war, and Solo, a sequel to Weapon in which Solo moves to NYC, thinking he will fit in.