Launching A New Mystery Series From Ground Zero
But first, this….
Location: Punta Gorda, Florida
In this issue:
- Eye-Witness Report From Hurricane Country
- Wonder Whodunnit in the New Literati Mystery Series by GK Jurrens
1. Eye-Witness Report From Hurricane Country
As the man (Uncle Sam) says,
and I’m paraphrasing here,
It ain’t pretty! And so much worse than you see on the news.
Courtesy: Patabook“On Sept. 28, Hurricane Ian made landfall near Cayo Costa in southwestern Florida as a dangerous, high-end Category 4 storm after plowing a path of destruction through the Caribbean, bringing particularly heavy rainfall and dangerous surf to Jamaica, the Cayman Islands, and western Cuba.”
Other than a national and global news highlight, you might ask, “So what?” You saw “Cayo Costa” mentioned above in the paragraph I quoted from the National Oceanographic & Atmospheric Administration of the US Department of Commerce. We, too, can literally see the island of Cayo Costa west of our condo complex. Miss Kay and I perch on the eastern shore of Charlotte Harbor.
Again, so what? You see, our home was literally at Ground Zero for the worst weather event to strike Florida in almost a century.
Yeah, it ain’t pretty, but we fared so much better than so many others.
“Ian came ashore near Cayo Costa, Florida, at 3:05 p.m. EDT with maximum sustained winds of 150 mph, tying the record for the fifth-strongest hurricane on record to strike the United States.”
NOAA, US Dept of Commerce
Three things about this particular storm you might find of interest, and by now, no surprise:
- Its strength: The human psyche just cannot comprehend what sustained winds (for hours) of 150+ MPH means in practical terms. Out in the open, a hundred MPH at ultra-low barometric pressure will suck the air right out of your lungs. Examples of the storm’s brutality: Ian tossed around hundred-foot boats weighing fifty tons, hundreds of feet from the water. There isn’t a sign or billboard in SW Florida that isn’t knocked down, twisted, or just gone. Hundred-year-old trees are ripped from the ground with their root balls still clinging to tons of dirt they brought up with them as they went over. There’s a saying here in the context of such a frightening phenomenon: “If it ain’t concrete, it’s rubble.” Even with several days notice of this muscular weather event’s approach, still, over a hundred souls in Florida alone perished.
- Its speed: Hurricane Ian was a very slow-moving storm. Again, in practical terms, that means it, or the hundreds of tornadoes spun off from its eyeball, chewed on anything in its path for more than a dozen hours before the worst of it moved on (per some of our neighbors). If this storm were an evil villain in one of my novels, its strategy would have been to intimidate, threaten, demoralize, and weaken you with a brutal beating. Then, he would torture you, managing to sustain exquisite pain for many hours, far beyond your physical and emotional endurance. When he would grow bored with your suffering, he’d fling your lifeless body and everything you own into the raging sea that had come ashore. But first, he’d ensure the total destruction of everything in your life that you ever loved. After all that, with the coldest of hearts, he’d leave any survivors around you feeling exposed, powerless, and if possible, penniless—for years—as if that would bring joy to the uncaring hole in his soul, a hole that can never be filled. Yeah, even though he’s just an amalgamation of environmental factors, I’d write him as an evil bastard with no hope of redemption. That’s how small we are in the presence of nature’s fury–we can’t be objective. But good people rallied. Survivors clung together. The best of humanity prevailed.
- Its size: At over 400 miles in diameter, for some, there was just no escape. It changed the lives of millions by cutting a swath of annihilation across a large portion of this part of the world (Atlantic and Caribbean islands, most of Florida, the SE United States, and the Northeast.
“In all, the storm knocked out power to more than four million customers in Florida, and an additional 1.1 million homes and businesses lost power when the storm plowed through the Carolinas. Recovery costs estimated to be around $47 billion in insured losses, according to research firm CoreLogic.”
NOAA, US Dept of Commerce
Because Miss Kay and I are fortunate enough to live (some of the time) in a steel-reinforced concrete building, our condo suffered minimal damage. Others in our association, however, weren’t so lucky.
While the main buildings all survived with aplomb, some windows and lanais (“porches”) were ruthlessly ripped away, allowing water to find a way inside. Some apartments are completely gutted due to water damage after the storm (as ours was after Hurricane Charley in 2004).
It’s what you can’t see at a glance that has a few of our neighbors pleading with their insurance companies for financial compensation.
And it’s that damage that will drive emotional distress for the rest of some people’s lives. What you can’t see.
Kay and I were lucky. And as a neighborhood, the repairs we effected across this 16-acre property after Hurricane Charley in 2004 served us well through this particularly nasty storm.
But beyond our neighborhood, the devastation was complete on the barrier islands between us on the mainland and the Gulf of Mexico (Cayo Costa, Pine Island, Captiva, Sanibel, Ft Myers Beach….). We don’t go down there, even if we could. Strict quarantine and/or curfews try to prevent looting. Many of these looters (“shoppers”) aren’t even from Florida!
A lot of the places we used to frequent are just… gone.
In early October, as we approached SW Florida in our motorhome right after the storm, we saw HUNDREDS of power and telephone maintenance/repair trucks, most from out of state heading south on I-75. Even a bunch of out-of-state fire trucks.
We saw military convoys pouring into the area to aid in disaster relief efforts.
FEMA (the feds) had thrown up entire tent and trailer CITIES as temporary shelters and housing for emergency crews imported from all over the country.
Countless Good Samaritans opened up their homes to the newly homeless, including several of our own neighbors.
Insurance companies imported hundreds of adjusters to assess damage. They have their own tents here and there as focal points for their adjusters.
Soldiers (Army, National Guard) passed out millions of bottles of water, helping local and state law enforcement and fire fighters with evacuations and other forms of disaster relief.
It was thrilling to see this side of humanity in action!
Our own community (Burnt Store Marina), while very well maintained with mostly new docks and other upgraded infrastructure, took a beating worse than our condos.
Boats piled on top of one another, and several docks are either gone or rendered useless. The storm snapped treated wood pilings a foot or more in diameter like toothpicks….
We still see so much damage even now, almost two months downrange from the storm. They’re still picking up the pieces. Repairs and restoration will take much longer.
We can’t see much of the costly damage to boats in the marina. I talked with a diver who says so many boats—the ones that didn’t sink or weren’t flung ashore—took their worst hits below the waterline. Damaged hulls, bent propellers and shafts, gouges and cracks. But most of these boats aren’t peoples’ homes or livelihoods. So we have nothing to complain about.
Nothing.
Fiberglass versus concrete?
No contest.
To answer your next inevitable question, we were not here on September 28. We were in our motorhome on Galveston Island on the Texas Gulf coast as the storm approached Florida.
We then slowed our return home by hanging out in NW Louisiana when the storm made landfall, essentially, right over our home. We then staged to just east of Tampa until power was restored to our neighborhood in early October. Otherwise, we would have become part of the problem.
Now it’s just a matter of each owner chipping in to pay the insurance deductible to address the association’s damage (gulp).
The South Shore community where we live within Burnt Store Marina was so fortunate. None of our neighbors and friends lost their lives. We were blessed to have been traveling at the time. If we’d been here, we’d have rolled on out of here on September 25th before the storm came ashore. The “nice” thing about hurricanes (unlike tornadoes)? You have DAYS of advance warning.
We are also blessed with the means to hire an experienced disaster clean-up company to get us back to some semblance of normal sooner rather than later.
How fortunate are we to have an “evacuation-capable” home?
A small matter of eight wheels, an 8.9 liter turbo diesel power plant and a 7.5 kilowatt generator!
Not to mention a co-pilot I love spending time with in this 300 square-foot house.
Kay and I are blessed. We can afford to take nothing for granted, especially in times of disaster and prolonged recovery.
Life is just too short, and getting shorter every day, my friend. For all of us.
2. Wonder Whodunnit in the New Literati Mystery Series
by GK Jurrens
Moving on….
Paperback edition to follow in all major online storefronts worldwide soon after Thanksgiving (well before Christmas, if you’re looking for gift ideas).
You can check out the basic premise and early reviews of Book One, “Voodoo Vendetta” here. But below is something extra,, just for you—a short chapter that reveals my main character’s motivation:
Sunday, June 21st
A Few Years From Now
DuSable Park
Chicago, Illinois
11:30AM
* * *
It would be a day to remember.
The mid-morning air glowed with uncharacteristic brilliance. The haze abated, allowing the summer sun to boast its magnificence in a sky of muted blue. A miraculous day, a unique day of days.
Melissa and Clancy Greigh stood in a line that meandered around the corner of their favorite food truck, Aphrodite’s Kitchen. They chuckled at each other’s stupid jokes, none of them worthy of a full-fledged laugh. But their hearts were full, unlike their stomachs.
Now it was their turn to order, at last. Aphro looked down at the pair of redheads, mother and daughter. In her heavy Greek accent, she chirped, “And what may I make for you lovely ladies?”
Instead of sharing an order of moussaka—their standard fare for their traditional Sunday morning outing to the park—Clance bubbled with anticipation as she delivered her well-rehearsed little speech. Though only six years old, Clance already enjoyed a sophisticated palate. “Mummy, could I have my own gyro today instead of splitting a moussaka? Please, please?” She widened her smiling eyes and wrinkled her tiny forehead as her eyebrows shot farther toward her hairline in gleeful expectation.
After all, she was a big girl now.
* * *
Mel grinned up at Aphro.
The street chef shrugged at the convincing little speech. Mum gazed down at her little redhead. What an amazing child. If only dear Greigh were here. She reflected on this, one of those defining moments in a parent’s life. He was missing it, but she knew how important his project was to him—and to all of them. After all, The Literati was their home.
Clance had become her own person, and her brilliance beamed for all to see. Mel imagined what her little girl would do with her gifts in life.
She was about to yield to her beautiful daughter’s big-girl plea, even though she knew the sandwich would be way too much for her. And then a terrible crack of thunder echoed through the park. Mel studied Clance’s wide-eyed wonder as a field of crimson blossomed across her tiny chest and her white camisole.
Mel registered instant concern, thinking Aphro might have dripped tomato sauce on her from above, which stains, but then lightning struck, and night fell.
* * *
Sir Aubrey Greigh labored at home.
With a maniacal focus, he pursued his twin passions—writing and crusading. He owned suite 7D in Hotel Literati. As a condo owner and president of “The Lit” Homeowner’s Association, he labored with prodigious passion to ensure their home never fell into the hands of a greedy land developer. If that happened, they’d demolish their beloved building.
Sure, they’d offer a generous buy-out, but that wasn’t the point at all, was it?
And then the call came that changed everything.
Later, the news anchor reported.
“A sniper fatally shot five people and wounded two others standing in line at a Greek food truck in DuSable Park near the waterfront earlier today. Authorities will release no details until they notify families of the victims….”
Wednesday, June 24th
Apartment 7D
Hotel Literati
Chicago, Illinois
* * *
Ten PM came and went.
Three days ago, Greigh’s universe went super nova. He sat on his sofa facing a dark fireplace… lost. He couldn’t even cry.
More than a hundred of his neighbors and sundry celebrities—he had no friends, really—shared his profound grief at the funeral earlier that afternoon, and afterward, for his ladies’ interment in the family crypt.
Just another unsolved random mass shooting. An acquaintance looped into the investigation told him the only “signature” left by the killer was a unique slug—a .338 Lapua Magnum cartridge—from an ancient weapon called an IWI DAN .338, a tactical rifle that hadn’t been manufactured for almost fifty years.
Two slugs from that weapon ended the lives of Melissa and Clancy Greigh. It might as well have ended his, too.
That’s all for now. So until… and wherever, my friend (from Ground Zero for a few more months)…
Gene (and Miss Kay)
