Summer on the Lake
August 20,2026
This picture was taken recently on Keuka Lake, one of the finger lakes in Upstate New York. The view taken is from the park that is in the town of Hammondsport. Beautiful view, isn’t it? My wife and I visited our oldest friends who live there on this lake. We were the ones that introduced them to the lake over forty years ago. They’re still there, and we are not. We sold back in 1988 and moved to Germantown, TN, a job-related move when I was employed by Eastman Kodak.
I had two important reasons to make the visit this year, even though we’ve been there many times previously. The first reason, and most important, is our friends. We’ve known them since the first year of our marriage sixty-one years ago, and neither of us is getting any younger. The second reason is I needed to refresh my memory on several places on the lake in particular. You see, I’ve been writing a new novel called the Keuka Lake Mystery. Which I just completed the review of my book with my beta readers (The Fantastic Five). They give me feedback on the flow of the story and character development and do some editing on spelling, missing words, and grammar. This generates a rewrite by me, based on their feedback. If there is consensus on the feedback or I like their individual suggestions, then I make changes on certain parts of the book. The outcome is I have a finished manuscript that is ready for the publisher and their staff of editors. The book after that process gets published and made available to you.
The story is a mystery/thriller that takes place in the mid-1980s. The main character is a detective, by the name of John Edward Bertone, with the nickname Jeb. He heads up a task force that exclusively investigates murder cases in western New York State. The first chapter in the book opens with Jeb and his wife Emily vacationing at their cottage on Stone Point at Keuka Lake. They both are awakened in the morning by noise coming from the outside on their right-of-way to the lake. A young female’s body is discovered floating next to Jeb’s boat down at the dock. This event will challenge Jeb and his team of detectives to solve a twisted and complicated case of murder.
I chose to write this story because we lived there on Keuka Lake for nearly five years. It was a very enjoyable experience for us and our four children to have that opportunity to experience the pleasures and peacefulness the lake can bring to one psyche. I used the cottage on Stone Point that we once owned as Jeb’s place in the story. I have very fond memories of spending time there during the spring, summer, and fall months. I hope you’ll take the opportunity to read this fictional story and capture the flavor and mystic nature of the lake itself. Several occasions we made an attempt to go there to live, but it never worked out. Maybe, if I sell enough of this story, I might be able to afford to buy a place on the lake once again. LOL
My next task is to finish the second book in the mystery series, which involves the same main character. The title I’m entertaining at the moment is Road Runner’s Triangle of Death. The story will take place in Memphis, Tennessee. and the town of Oxford, Mississippi. The story is fictional and entails solving a twenty-year-old serial killer case. The final book in the series is already written and sitting in manuscript form.
Well, that’s it for this month, until September. Keep reading, especially my stories; I want to be able to get back to Keuka Lake.