Silver Lake: A Place for All Seasons
Peeking over the scenic shores of the mighty Mississippi river into the Missouri Ozarks, nestled next to East Cape Girardeau is our fictional town of Silver Lake, Illinois.
Silver Lake is a four season tourist area with many popular attractions, winter, spring, summer and fall. From bungee jumps, hot air balloon rides, fishing on the Mississippi river to whitewater rafting, Silver Lake caters to the middle class and high end jet setter tourist.
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Situated on the Mississippi river across from Mingo National Wildlife Refuge and Missouri's Mark Twain National Park nestled in the Ozarks, Silver Lake is the ideal natural vacation spot.
Asia Reynolds, (semi-famous documentary film maker), Elise Snuggles (African-American cable news person & honey bee raiser), Sgt. Sheila Rodriguez (motorcycle cop in the Silver Lake Police Department) all grew up together and function as a team when it comes to solving any kind of crime in this small, rural town.
Added to that are the Almonte family, organic dairy ranchers. The family consists of Cisco Almonte, primary rancher and eldest son of Jose; Officer Chico Almonte, middle son of Jose and buff boyfriend of Sheila Rodriguez; Julio Almonte, youngest son of Jose, also a dairy rancher on the family farm; and Maria Luisa, the divorced, fiery, ex-wife of Jose Almonte (who lives in Mexico, but visits occasionally).
Combined with the wealthy tourist crowd are the families of the local state university - Central Illinois University and the summer artisans that migrate to Silver Lake from all over the world to sell handicrafts such as pottery, jewelry -- and play street music. They tend to be hippies.
This mixture creates some interesting plots in terms of criminal activity.
For animal lovers, we have quite a few animal characters such as Nino, Officer Chico Almonte's king-sized black stallion (a gentle giant) used as his mount during his routine beat around town; Zucchini, Asia Reynolds huge Husky-German Shepard mix highly trained Search and Rescue dog; all of Frankie Franklin's private rescue animals on her ranch; and rescue-du-jour on Asia's ranch which includes, recently, a rescued donkey named Punkin and her life companion, a red, long-haired Chihuahua named Fuzzy Bud.