Many people love to travel, and the same people often enjoy reading. Traveling isn't always an option, so turning to a good book might be the next best thing. Oftentimes it's fun to read books that take place in places we like to travel, or places we're familiar with. Whether it be a city, country side, or small town, the setting is one of the most important parts of a story and one of the reasons someone chooses to pick up a book. Since we're in the heart of the Finger Lakes in Seneca County, here are a list of books with settings that may be enjoyable!
5 books set in the Finger Lakes and Seneca County
Hidden Pictures (Horror)
Jason Rekulak
Hidden Pictures is a psychological, paranormal horror novel told from the point of view of a young, recovering addict who gets a job working for a wealthy family as a nanny for the summer. Woven throughout are eerie images and ghostly faces sure to have you reading with all the lights on.
When Mallory Quinn lands her job as a live-in nanny, she thinks she hit the jackpot. Having not spoken to her mother in years and coming out the other side of a terrible drug addition, she works hard to make her sponsor proud. She moves into the guest cottage in the backyard oasis of the new family's home, Ted and Caroline Maxwell.
Caroline works for the V.A. as a psychologist and believes those suffering from substance abuse deserve a second chance, and when little Teddy shows how excited he is for Mallory to live with them, she hires her immediately. Mallory is ecstatic to be a part of a wealthy family, living in a nice neighborhood in New Jersey and away from the streets of South Philly.
Where the Finger Lakes come in
Author, Jason Rekulak, often references Seneca Lake and Wine Country throughout the novel, and frames it as a peaceful, beautiful place to escape to. He describes the trails around Seneca Lake perfectly, the hot air balloon festival that happens in the Finger Lakes, and a goat farm where the family creates cheeses and milk for tourists to purchase.
And, if you love Wegmans, that's the most popular grocery store to shop at for the characters in this book! Of course, they're shopping at the New Jersey Wegmans' not the Finger Lakes ones. It's still exciting to see a regional business mentioned in such a popular book!
This book has 52,438 ratings on Amazon, giving it 4.4 stars, and 319,973 ratings on Goodreads giving it 4.2 stars.
The Breakaway (Romance)
Jennifer Weiner
The Breakaway follows a 33-year-old Abby Stein, who is happy with her mundane life in Philadelphia where she has friends, a bicycle, and belongs to a bicycling club. Though she doesn't have the career she would like, and her relationship with her mother isn't good, she's happy.
Abby is engaged to her childhood sweetheart, Mark Medoff, who she met at weight-loss camp fifteen years prior where her mother forced her to attend.
While she's excited to marry Mark, a fling from her past named Sebastian is stuck in her head. He's not a great guy, he's a serial dater, yet she can't stop thinking about him.
Unfortunately for her, she ends up leading a cycling event that runs all the way to Niagara Falls, 700 miles away, where she runs into Sebastian, who she was trying to avoid. When she attempts to stay away from him, the unexpected addition of her mother on the trip ruins her plans.
Where the Finger Lakes come in
Main characters Abby and Sebastian end up having dinner together at a restaurant, market and butcher shop that sells local craft beverages and foods. While the cyclists are traveling on their way north, they stop at the local Seneca Falls restaurant, Sackett's Table located on Bridge Street.
In an article published by the Finger Lakes Times, they spoke to the author who said she took the cycling trip herself in 2022 and had a delicious meal at Sackett's Table. It was so good she wrote the exact same meal into the book. Page 310 of the book shares that the meal they had at Sackett's Table was a cocktail with deviled eggs, homemade potato chips, a pasta dish, stuffed chicken, and a pork chop from the butcher's case.
Following their dinner they had dessert and took a walk "in the Birthplace of Women's Rights."
This book has 8,901 ratings on Amazon, giving it 4.2 stars, and 46,762 ratings on Goodreads, giving it 3.77 stars.
Lock it Down (Mystery and Book 1 of the Cady and Blue Mystery Series)
Susan James
Lock It Down follows Cady Collette, who works and lives at a tiny library in Upstate, New York. Her husband disappeared six years prior, and she tried to go on living life never knowing what really happened.
As she finally starts to gain some footing, tragedy strikes. The investigator, who never found her husband, is tasked with solving the new case, and Cady watches as her finally balanced out life falls to pieces and she becomes wrapped up in another mystery.
Where the Finger Lakes come in
The main character, Cady, lives in an apartment above the Waterloo Library, which in real life is Fatzinger Hall. The book references a number of local places and things, down to street names in Waterloo, NY. It even references a casino (before del Lago was opened and running).
This book has 15 ratings on Amazon, giving it 4.5 stars, and 24 ratings on Goodreads, giving it 3.75 stars.
World on Fire (Mystery and Book 2 of the Cady and Blue Mystery Series)
Susan James
World on Fire once again follows Cady Collette as she continues working as a librarian in a small Upstate New York town. She's finally come to terms over her husband's disappearance, and is settling into her life again. That is, before a teenager in her book-club goes missing. To solve the mystery, she finds herself in some of the not-so-great places in the Finger Lakes region.
There's also an unsettled relationship dynamic at play between her and Detective Blue!
Where the Finger Lakes come in
This book takes place in the exact same location as the first one, in Waterloo, New York. While I haven't read this one yet, it sounds like it ventures to other areas in the region!
This book has 16 ratings on Amazon, giving it 4.7 stars, and 5 ratings on Goodreads, giving it 4.2 stars.
The Lives They Left Behind (non-fiction)
Darby Penney & Peter Stastny with photos by Lisa Rinzler
The Lives They Left Behind tells the true story of numerous patients that resided at Willard Psychiatric Center in Seneca County New York years ago. Willard was a psychiatric hospital for decades, and today the campus is no longer in use.
When it was taken over by NYSDOCCS, one person was tasked with going through the buildings to decide what to keep and what to throw away. Upon entering a locked attic, a number of old suitcases were discovered. These suitcases belonged to patients of the institution and were the belongings they took with them to the hospital when they were admitted. The likelihood is that they never took them with them when they left, and they're buried in the cemetery across the street from the campus that can still be visited today.
More than 400 suitcases were located in the attic, but only ten of them are detailed in this book. Each suitcase tells the story of a life of someone before, and during their stay at Willard.
Where the Finger Lakes Come in
This is a non-fiction book, so it's about the Willard Campus located in Willard, New York. The campus sits on the shore of Seneca Lake, and though it's no longer in use, many of its buildings are still standing vacant. The cemetery is right across the road and open to the public, but grave markers have been removed, causing many family members to not be able to find their relatives remains. If you would like to learn more about Willard, check out this blog I wrote last fall.
This book has 1,442 ratings on Amazon, giving it 4.3 stars, and 3,851 ratings on Goodreads, giving it 3.69 stars.
