Author’s Guest Post
Where to Live?
By
Lena Gregory
I’ve lived most of my life in a small town on the south shore of Eastern Long Island, along with four generations of my family. My grandfather owned a deli in town, where I started working stocking shelves and sweeping floors when I was twelve years old. When I was a little older, I started working the breakfast shift, the inspiration for the All-Day Breakfast Café Mystery series.
I’ve always loved the small-town feel, the way everyone knows everyone, especially the families who have lived here for generation after generation as mine has. When I married a man from the neighboring town, it seemed natural to settle down where we’d grown up and start our family.
Then my husband got a job offer in Florida, and he accepted. We moved down right after my daughter finished kindergarten. I had only ever been to Florida once, when my daughter was three and we spent three days in Disney World, so I had no clue what to expect.
Just like Gia Morelli in Scone Cold Killer, I was in for a few surprises.
I was used to deer crossing signs, since Long Island is home to a large deer population, but the first time I drove my daughter to school and saw a bear crossing sign, I actually turned around and went back to see it again. I thought I was mistaken, but nope, it was a bear crossing sign. Until that moment, I had no clue there were bears in Florida.
Then there were the love bugs, and they were everywhere. And lizards, which I’d never even seen in real life before I moved, and snakes, sometimes poisonous ones.
Aside from the critters, the weather brought a few surprises as well. On the rare occasions Long Island gets tornadoes, they are small F-1s that do very little damage. One night, about six months after we moved to Florida, I had just gotten into bed and turned on the TV, and the weather report came on. A line of damaging storms were coming through. The reporter said if you live on my road, “take cover now,” and I freaked out, to put it mildly, woke my daughter and stuffed her and my dog into the tub, even tried to wrestle a mattress into the tiny bathroom. (That was so not happening.)
Like Gia, whenever I got homesick, I spent a lot of time checking off the positives and negatives of living in Florida and New York.
Because there were also amazing things about living in Florida. The natural springs, with their crystal-clear water, gorgeous blue skies—even in the winter when the skies in New York are permanently gray. And who could complain when everyone in New York was shoveling out from under a foot of snow, and I was laying by the pool?
In the end, my decision was made for me when my husband and I both got job opportunities in New York. We ended up moving back to New York and visiting Florida every year, because we missed it so much.
What about you? Have you ever had a hard time deciding where you wanted to live? Leave a comment and let me know.
About Mistletoe Cake Murder
Mistletoe Cake Murder (All-Day Breakfast Cafe Mystery)
Cozy Mystery
6th in Series
Setting – Florida
Publisher : Lyrical Press (October 12, 2021)
Print length : 219 pages
Digital ASIN : B08T6JHSZT
’Tis the season for celebrating when Gia Morelli’s holidays include both a wedding and yuletide festivities. Until someone naughty delivers a most unwanted Christmas gift—murder. . .
For a native New Yorker, palm trees and warm temperatures don’t equal winter, much less Christmastime. Nevertheless, Gia Morelli’s friends have decked the halls and trimmed the trees to truly welcome her into their “family” with an old-fashioned Boggy Creek, Florida holiday season. Even more joyous, Savannah Mills is getting married on Christmas Eve—the greatest gift Gia could ever wish for her best friend.
But when Gia and Savannah stop by the caterer for a final tasting a week before the wedding, they overhear another bride arguing with her son about her husband-to-be. Moments later, the woman is sampling a piece of wedding cake—gorgeously decorated with mistletoe frosting—then suddenly dies.
Now Gia’s caterer friends are the prime suspects in what appears to be murder by poisoning. To clear their names and ensure Savannah has a merry matrimony will require Gia to conjure up a Christmas miracle . . .
Includes recipes from the All-Day Breakfast Café!
About Lena Gregory
Lena grew up in a small town on the south shore of eastern Long Island, but she recently traded in cold, damp, gray winters for the warmth and sunshine of central Florida, where she now lives with her husband, three kids, son-in-law, and four dogs. Her hobbies include spending time with family, reading, and walking. Her love for writing developed when her youngest son was born and didn’t sleep through the night. She works full-time as a writer and a freelance editor and is a member of Sisters in Crime.
Author Links
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Purchase Links
Amazon: – Barnes & Noble Kobo Kensington Apple Google Play GoodReads Link
Giveaway
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I really like reading this series, even though I’m now two books behind. I wouldn’t actually buy the book with the gift card, I would use it to buy a book or two for my middle schooler, who likes to read on her Kindle when she should be in bed asleep.
It’s nice to hear that young people still like to read for pleasure. Good luck with the giveaways!
Thank you so much for sharing the release of Mistletoe Cake Murder!
LOVE Lena Gregory’s books! I’ve had “Mistletoe Cake Murder” on my TBR list since it was first mentioned as an upcoming book. I would love the opportunity to read and review this book to help promote the book and to let others know about this wonderful author.
Never being a person that takes change well, I figured that we would always stay where we had lived since married – especially after building our home in the country many years ago. It’s where my parents lived and the only home I’d known since Dad retired from the Army. We had vacationed to the northern part of the state in the Ozark Mountains as often as we would loving the area. After Mom went to join Dad in their heavenly home and nothing keeping us where we were, we started wondering what it would be like to move to our dream destination. Let’s say I knocked hubby over when on our way home from one of our Ozark trips, I stated that it would be awesome to move there permanently. We talked about it all the way home. In the weeks to come we seriously began to consider if it was what we wanted and was it feasible. To make an even longer story short, we ended up listing our home and selling it the second day it was listed on the first showing. We were able to connect with a young Mennonite builder who agreed to build our home on a piece of property we had found. We downsized discarding ourselves of a lot of “stuff” and built the smaller dream home we always wanted just for the two of us. Everything fell in place reassuring me that it was the right decision. Best one I think we ever made. We love it here! Now older and with more medical issues, we are extremely thankful that we did it when we did because I doubt that we would have been able to do now what we did then.
So my advise to anyone else would be follow your heart, do your research and be willing to take a chance. It might be the best thing you ever did.
Thank you so much, Kay! And thank you for sharing! That is such an amazing story, and I am so happy for you! That’s how it was for me when we moved this time, like it was meant to be. Everything just fell into place, and now I feel like I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be, doing exactly what I’m supposed to be doing. 🙂