Lucy Burdette - "Unsafe Haven"
Dear Reader,
In the mystery world, I’m mostly known for my series featuring Hayley Snow, a food critic living in quirky Key West.
Over the years, darker ideas have come to me that did not fit in that genre. I filed away snippets of characters and plots that seemed too gritty or dark for a cozy mystery even though I recognized them as elements of a good story. For example, what if a terrified young girl handed you a newborn—and then vanished?
Starting in 2009, I began to save headlines from the news that would lead to Unsafe Haven--stories about young women who abandoned hours-old infants in astonishing places. One newborn was left in a restroom in the Hilton Hotel in Key West. Another headline told the story about a teenager attending a dance who went to the ladies’ room because of cramps. Not realizing that she was pregnant, she delivered her baby right there, left it in the trash, and returned to the dance. Another baby was stashed in a nativity scene outside a church. What kind of girl or woman would abandon a newborn this way?
These stories haunted me—I wanted to understand how a new mother might make this seemingly impossible choice.
As I thought about writing Addison’s story, I did not picture her as a young woman who didn't care about her child. I imagined this book to be about a girl who was desperate and scared about something; so desperate that giving birth alone and pushing the new baby into a stranger’s arms felt like the best decision—the only decision—she could make at that moment. I hoped that readers would come to understand and share the agony of her choice and the fear that was driving it.
My writer's brain understood that this character and story would not fit into the framework of a cozy culinary mystery. The challenge became whether I could tell Addison’s story in a different voice—dark, compelling, emotional, relatable—with a gritty city as the backdrop. The result is Unsafe Haven. I hope you will enjoy it!
– Lucy Burdette
Lucy Burdette, aka clinical psychologist Roberta Isleib, is the author of the popular Key West Food Critic mystery series, including the latest, A SCONE OF CONTENTION. Lucy’s first novel of suspense, UNSAFE HAVEN, has been published by Severn House. Her books and stories have been shortlisted for Agatha, Anthony, and Macavity awards. THE KEY LIME CRIME won the bronze medal for popular fiction from the Florida Book Awards in 2020. She’s a member of Mystery Writers of America and Sisters in Crime, and a past president of Sisters in Crime. She currently serves as president of the Friends of the Key West Library. Visit her at: https://lucyburdette.com