Orchids in the Snow

by Charlie Hudson

Orchids in the Snow is narrated by Andrea Randall, wife of Colonel Larry Randall, a B-52 pilot in the U.S. Air Force. Andrea has been by Larry's side for twenty-three years, dutifully serving as helpmate and mother, moving from base to base, coping with Larry's combat tour in Vietnam, contributing her time to the activities of the Officers' Wives Club, and raising their two children.

The novel is set in September 1982 at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, where Andrea is alone because Larry has taken a one year, unaccompanied tour to Turkey. The Randall's son, Brian, is now a B-52 Bomber pilot like his father and their daughter, Tricia, is a sophomore in college. Andrea has an established circle of friends, community activities to keep her busy, and is near Tricia. She resents Larry's decision to go to Turkey alone, but accepts it as necessary for his career and presumes the year will pass uneventfully. Then she meets Sam.

Sam -- Samantha Dearden -- is a Department of the Air Force civilian employee who arrives from Washington, D.C., where she worked in the Pentagon. She is ten years younger than Andrea, divorced, a single mother, openly snubs conventional behavior with her nonchalant promiscuity, and is altogether an unlikely companion. Yet Sam's cavalier attitude is combined with perceptive warmth, and she recognizes a need in Andrea to perhaps move beyond the narrow part she has played in life.

Sam introduces Andrea to a "Cheers-like" group of younger Air Force officers who routinely meet at the Officers' Club for drinks, dinner and conversation. Big Mac, Hank, Ginny, and Paula are single and part of a changing Air Force; the new generation, untried in combat, more open in their views of sex, love, and marriage. Andrea is simultaneously interested and puzzled as she wonders if the freedom and choices they face are better than the social constraints she occasionally feels.

Andrea is initially reluctant to join the group, unable to believe she has anything in common with them. She is, however, intrigued by the idea and is aware that for the first time in her adult life she has free time on her hands since the family duties which traditionally consumed her have virtually disappeared. The group doesn't treat her as "the Colonel's wife", and during the months that pass, the reader watches Andrea open up and enter a time of personal growth.

It is also a period of conflict, however, for there are moments when Andrea withdraws, uncomfortable with the feelings she experiences with Sam's disregard for public opinion. It is difficult for her to understand Sam's philosophical advice of, "you get drunk, you get laid, and you get over it," when Paula's romantic hopes are unfulfilled. Andrea is torn between her affection for Sam and the opinions of those who disapprove of her lifestyle.

Yet, even as Andrea begins to expand her concept of what is morally acceptable, she discovers her husband, Larry, disapproves of her new friends, and there are indications he may be having an affair with a female Captain in Turkey. Her marriage and the security she has known is threatened, a possibility she had previously considered remote. Could it be her life has been built on a false foundation which is crumbling? The more she sees around her, the less certain she is about her own life, about the clash between surface appearances and the truth beneath social niceties.

Andrea's doubts about Larry are fueled by a series of disturbing coincidences and her struggle with her unforeseen trauma is further complicated when Sam becomes involved in an explosive situation that could have serious personal consequences. The subsequent emotional turmoil surrounding these events forces Andrea to re-examine the views she had always accepted as unshakable truths. It is this examination that causes Andrea to better understand how she truly feels about herself and those close to her.

274 pages, Paperback

First published November 12, 1998

About the author

Set aside the fact that I was going to be a French teacher, which wasn’t a bad idea. That, by the way, can be clearly traced to my affection for the original movie of "Sabrina". Although my intent was strengthened by spending my senior year of high school in France on a scholarship, my grandfather’s influence took over when I returned. I decided to follow in his footsteps, go to law school, and enter the small family law firm in a very small Louisiana town. Since we lived in Natchitoches, Louisiana, the home of Northwestern State University, going to college in town was the economically feasible choice. Paying for law school was going to be another matter. It’s a bit difficult to believe now, but at that time, women were not allowed to go through ROTC or the military academies, and so they had special programs to bring women into the military directly from college. The special program paid for my senior year of college, would require me to only serve for two years, and then I would have the GI bill that I could use for law school. Voila!, problem solved.

Except that one thing led to another and it was actually 22 years before I left the Army. (Not to worry, two of my cousins went to law school and upheld the family name.) During the process of my first career, I became somewhat of an inadvertent pioneer, holding several jobs that had been traditionally held only by men. It really was a matter of timing; not a grand scheme. For those who have not yet had two decades-plus slip by you, it’s amazing when you look back. Those 22 years saw my career with assignments overseas and in the U.S., my first marriage, an unexpected pregnancy, the birth of our son Dustin, and the tragic accident that left me as a widow with a four-month old son. Then it was seven years of single parenting, and a night at the Officers’ Club (on a Friday the 13th no less), when I met the man who was to become my second husband. The next part of my career saw more time overseas including both of us serving in Desert Storm, then Italy, then Hawaii, and my participation in Operation Uphold Democracy in Haiti in 1995. And yes, it was in Hawaii where my husband introduced me to the wonders of scuba diving and the fascinating underwater world.

I was coming up on retirement in the summer of 1995 when my husband strongly urged me to take some time and work on that novel that I had been putting off. We were on our way to Washington, D.C., for my husband's assignment to the Pentagon. In the “write what you know” vein, my first novel, Orchids in the Snow, centered around a military wife. When it became evident that my venture into publishing was not going to launch me onto a best seller list, I took a position with a small services and Information Technology firm, as do many retired military.

I balanced book and short-story writing with my “day job” as well as fulfilled my military wife duties, and adjusted to having a high schooler. It was also in this stage of our lives when we modified our plans for my husband’s retirement so that we would actually move away from the corporate world and focus on fun second careers. That led us to South Florida where my husband teaches scuba and I write.

Do join me on my web site of http://charliehudson.net where the first chapter of all my books are posted.