The Orange Blossom Special (36 page)

M
Y GRATITUDE ALWAYS
to Kathy Robbins, whose friendship and wisdom means the world to me. Elisabeth Scharlatt, new friend, and editor, has made my collaboration with her and Algonquin Books a joyous one. Thank you to Brunson Hoole, Kathy Pories, Tammi Brooks, Anne Winslow, Dove Pedlosky, and everyone else at Algonquin for their care and time.

I am fortunate that my friends are also astute editors: Lisa Grunwald, Kathy Rich, Victoria Skurnick, Jill Bauer, Carl Lehmann-Haupt, and my sister, Miriam Brumer, read early versions and made valuable suggestions.

Lisa Auel, executive director of the Matheson Historical Center in Gainesville, Florida, provided me with history and photographs of the area, and I am grateful for her generosity.

My husband, Gary Hoenig, welcomed the characters of this novel into our home and then nurtured them onto these pages. Like so many things in my life, he has made this book possible.

Published by

ALGONQUIN BOOKS OF CHAPEL HILL
Post Office Box 2225
Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27515-2225

a division of
WORKMAN PUBLISHING
225 Varick Street
New York, New York 10014

© 2005 by Betsy Carter. All rights reserved.

“Lollipop” by Beverly Ross and Julius Dixon © 1958 by Edward B.
Marks Music Company. Copyright renewed in 1986. Used by permission.
All rights reserved.

This is a work of fiction. While, as in all fiction, the literary perceptions and insights are based on experience, all names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. No reference to any real person is intended or should be inferred.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Carter, Betsy, 1945–

The Orange Blossom Special: a novel / by Betsy Carter.—1st ed.
p. cm.

HC ISBN 978-1-56512-449-3

1. Mothers and daughters—Fiction. 2. Gainesville (Fla.)—Fiction.
3. Loss (Psychology)—Fiction. 4. Railroad stations—Fiction.
5. Single mothers—Fiction. 6. Widows—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3603.A7768O73 2005
813′.6—dc22

2004066037

E-book ISBN 978-1-56512-880-4

ALSO BY BETSY CARTER

The Puzzle King

Swim to Me

Nothing to Fall Back On: The Life and Times
of a Perpetual Optimist