Raised as an army brat, Angie Ricketts though she knew what she was in for when she eloped with Darrin - then an Infantry Lieutenant - on the eve of his deployment to Somalia. Since then, Darrin, now a Colonel, has been deployed eight times, serving four of those tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. And Ricketts has lived every one of those deployments intimately - distant enough to survive the years apart from her husband, but close enough to share a common purpose and a lifestyle they both love.

With humor, candor, and a brazen attitude, Ricketts pulls back the curtain on a subculture many...