TRAVEL WITH SERENA - SOUTH FLORIDA WITH GUEST AUTHOR RANDY RAWLS

Travel editor Serena Brower invited author Randy Rawls here today to talk about a well-known vacation destination and home to many talented authors – South Florida. 

Randy is a retired US Army officer and Department of Defense civilian. After retiring, he turned his hand to writing fiction. He’s the multi-published author of the Ace Edwards, Dallas PI series, as well as many short stories. Living in South Florida where the line between fiction and non-fiction blurs gives him a rich environment in which to harvest plots. His latest release is Hot Rocks, set in South Florida. Learn more about Randy and his books at his website. -- AP

Living in South Florida

I live in South Florida. For those of you not lucky enough to be one of my neighbors, you might not grasp where South Florida is. You could be thinking it's south of an imaginary line drawn between Melbourne and Tampa, or some such. Not true. To those of us who live here, South Florida consists of the three most southern counties on the peninsula, Atlantic side—Palm Beach, Broward, and Miami-Dade. We call it South Florida. Others can label it whatever they want.

As you read this, you're probably picturing some of those scary headlines about hurricanes. Yeah, South Florida gets hurricanes—infrequently. I've lived here since 1998, 14 years. We've had one hurricane during that time, Hurricane Wilma in 2005. And on a scale of 1 to 10, it was about a 2. Pretty weak. Yeah, it took off some roof tiles, blew over some trees, and, of course, knocked out power for anything from a couple of days to a couple of weeks. But, heck, everyone here knows Florida Power and Light can't maintain power on a clear day, much less when the wind blows. Don't get me wrong, though. When you can't go to the market or the gas station and you're trapped in a dark house with no air conditioning, it's no fun. But we don't have horrendous tornados, or dust storms, or earthquakes, or blizzards. In fact, we don't have more than a week's worth of cold nights a year. I call it paradise, and I love it here.

However, South Florida is also a state of mind. We have a saying. There is no fiction in South Florida. No matter what you write, it happened yesterday, is happening today, or will happen tomorrow. I am a firm believer in that adage. I mean, where else can you have real news stories about body parts being found in suitcases scattered along the Interstate? It has happened here—more than once.

South Florida is a writer's paradise. It must be because we have so many talented writers here. It's a pleasure to be one of them, well, maybe not the talented part, but certainly a writer. As for talent, take a look at my new release Hot Rocks. It features Beth Bowman as she takes on a strange mystery. And, yes, Beth lives in South Florida, having moved here from Texas—like someone else I know. And if you choose to put me in the talented class, I won't argue a bit. J 

If you happen to be near South Florida, I'll have my book launch for Hot Rocks at 7 p.m. on November 30^th at Murder on the Beach Mystery Bookstore, 273 Pineapple Grove Way, Delray Beach, FL 33444, (561) 279-7790.  Come on in for hors d'oeuvres, wine, beer (Killian's Red Lager, of course), and me.  If you're not near us, order a copy of Hot Rocks at www.murderonthebeach.com.

Hot Rocks is Randy's latest novel, a South Florida mystery featuring PI Beth Bowman. Beth takes on a simple case, but soon discovers that things are not as they seem. A husband is not a husband. A wife is not a wife. A homeless man is not . . . Yet, one thing is real. Someone wants Beth dead.

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