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Today on Salty Inspirations, I’m featuring a character guest post from Gray Hanover from Sconed to Death by Betty Hechtman. The story offers a fun behind-the-scenes look at life in Indiana, family expectations, and small-town change through Gray’s perspective.
Character Guest Post – Gray Hanover
From Sconed to Death by Betty Hechtman.
What am I doing in the middle of nowhere Indiana? It’s all because Annie Sara inherited that school house.
She’s been like part of my entourage of helpers forever. I guess you would call her like a hired big sister. Now since she’s here running the tea room and yarn shop until she sells the place, so am I. Though if I am here much longer, the injections in my lips will have worn off and no more plumped up lips.
People think it must be great having celebrity parents, but take it from me it’s not. How would you like it if people were always looking at you. One time we went to a fast-food drive thru place. It wasn’t for food. Camille Constantine would never actually eat a burger and fries. All we got was ice tea–unsweetened of course. The person handing us the drinks almost fell out of the service window because she was trying to take a selfie with us.
My mother thinks whatever I do reflects on her and wants me to be an actor or a model, but it’s not really for me. I don’t want to go through my life being compared to her.
Being here in Indiana with Annie Sara is so different. It seems like everyone has already forgotten that I have famous parents. They like me for me. Annie Sara is making me live up to my vanity title as partner in the school house shop. Camille “invested” in the place, though Annie Sara insists it is just a loan. I actually kind of like helping her make the finger sandwiches for the tea room and act as a server. I have a garden too. My nails are a wreck from it, but it makes me happy to flowers that I grew and put them in vases on the tables in the tea room.
I sort of have a boyfriend. Cooper Smith is part of the Franklin PD. He is so different than anyone I dated in L.A. I never knew if they really liked me or I was just a good connection for their career. Annie Sara keeps telling me we’re only here temporarily and not to get too involved. I know that Camille has been putting pressure on Annie Sara to break us up. Cooper’s mother doesn’t like me at all either. It seems like kind of a Romeo and Juliet thing which makes it even more romantic.
I have to say that things have changed with Annie Sara and me since I’ve been here. Her father is my parents’ talent agent and I have always felt that that she had to please them. Like be the food police and make sure I only ate the diet meals Camille had delivered and stuff like that. But now she’s been acting like a real big sister who cares about what I want. That means everything.
It’s not all fun and games though. Annie Sara and I walked right into a murder scene. Ha ha. My mother only played a detective and I got to be a real one.
Sconed to Death (A Crochet and Crumpets Mystery) by Betty HechtmanAbout Sconed to Death
Cozy Mystery
2nd in Series
Setting – Indiana
Publisher : Severn House
Publication date : June 2, 2026
Print length : 224 pages
Hardcover
ISBN-10 : 1448318629
ISBN-13 : 978-1448318629
Digital
ISBN-13: 9781448318636
Audiobook
ASIN B0GH2HY42Y
MP3CD
ISBN-13 : 979-8228941519
ASIN : B0GS74NJGP
A brand-new series from the queen of culinary cozies. Full to the brim with crochet, crumpets, and crime! The perfect ingredients for murder . . . Annie Hart has transformed the yarn shop she inherited into a thriving business and tea shop. Now she needs to sell it so she can move back to LA. She just has to ensure that young Toby Swanson is kept on as the supplier of their famous scones. Annie decides to secretly enter Toby in a new reality TV cooking show. But his application video takes a deadly twist when Annie and her business partner, Gray, discover a body on the beach while filming. Even worse, it looks like the young woman had been enjoying Toby’s cherry scones and the shop’s rose tea before her death. With the help of her misfit group of local yarn artists, can Annie find a killer and save her reputation? Readers who love super cozy culinary mysteries will eat up this new charming cozy mystery series.
About Betty Hechtman
Despite completing a Fine Arts degree, all Betty Hechtman ever wanted to be was a writer. She wrote a weekly column in her college newspaper and later wrote magazine and newspaper pieces, along with short stories and a prize-winning screenplay. She has published over thirty books across four cozy mystery series, all of which have yarn craft. She lives with her family in Southern California
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Sconed to Death -Excerpt
ONE
It was early Monday morning as I rushed ahead to unlock the door to the school house—not to let students in. It had been eons since the red brick building had been used for that purpose. Now it was home to a yarn shop and tea room. There were some books and gift items too. I felt a sense of pride as I looked at the distinctive structure that belonged to me.
The air felt languid here in Franklin, Indiana and I struggled to get out of the hoodie I had put on automatically before I went outside. When I was home in L.A., going to work at the children’s boutique in Malibu, the hoodie was needed even on a late June morning. Not here for sure.
I had expected to be back in L.A. by now, but, well, things hadn’t worked out as I had planned. When I heard my uncle Cyrus had left me the school house, my original thought was to just take a look at the property in person and put it up for sale. I had no idea that it housed a yarn shop until I got here and saw the sign hanging at an angle that said Classy Yarn. It fell off when I tried to right it.
Then it made sense why he had left the property to me. He knew I had a passion for yarn and had been crocheting and knitting since I was a kid. He must have thought I would be happy to have access to all that fiber.
When I arrived, the whole place looked unsettled and neglected, as the shop had been closed since the previous owner, Eleanor Danton, died. Bugs had feasted on some of the yarn and the skeins appeared to have been stuffed haphazardly into the cubbies that lined the large room.
I had never planned to get involved with anything more than clearing it up to make it presentable to sell. But then I had met Jenny Swanson and her son Toby, along with Liv Stein. They were all part of the group of yarn crafters who used to have get-togethers at the school house and prevailed on me to let the group meet while I was clearing the place up.
Jenny and Toby owned the local bakery and won me over with friendship and delicious treats. Liv acted like an advisor from the start and gave me the lowdown on the town. She even convinced me to let Eleanor’s cat Jack stay while I was working on the place. She let me find out for myself that the white Persian had some magical skills.
I hadn’t meant for it to happen, but in no time, I felt part of the group and listened when they pitched me on how having a tea room would make the place more sellable. To make a long story short, I added the tea room, and there were some complications, like getting too attached to the place and being concerned about what would happen to it when a new owner took over. So, here I was still running the yarn shop and tea room.
I didn’t turn the open sign over yet. It was still hours until we would be ready for business. There was lots to do to prepare, starting with getting the morning deliveries. I dropped the hoodie on a bench that sat near the entrance and took a moment to survey my domain. I had expected the school house to be in town, but it was actually out in the country. The whole property had been neglected, and along with fixing up the inside, I had made changes to the outside as well before putting it up for sale. The overgrown grass had been cut and there was an area that looked almost like a lawn. The garden we had added was flourishing and there were hints of red where the first tomatoes were ripening. The rows of flowers added color. Tall old trees stood like sentries, shading the picturesque building that still had the old bell tower that had called the kids to school.
Behind the building, a stone walk path led to a cottage. It had been a surprise bonus and gave me a place to live while I did the fix-up. Beyond it, the area had been left to go natural with knee-high grass, wildflowers and more tall old trees. There were wild strawberries and a wild blackberry patch as well. It felt like something out of a fairy tale to me. I turned when I heard a crunch of gravel as a minivan pulled into the parking area. The side door slid open, and a moment later, Toby Swanson was coming toward me carrying a tray of baked goods. He was in his mid-teens and was still wearing his baker’s apron over his soft build.
“Special delivery of scones and crumpets,” he said. He was always smiling, but there was something extra now. Pride or self-worth, something like that. I gave him a thumbs up and opened the door for him.
Jenny got out of the driver’s side. She had a dusting of flour in her dark hair and had on a white apron like her son’s. She gathered up a basket of bread and stopped before going inside.
“Thank you again for giving him this chance to provide baked goods for the tea room, Annie Sara,” she said. “You have no idea what this means to Toby.” She looked in the direction he had gone. “The way he loves baking . . .” she said, letting out a sigh. “I’m so glad he doesn’t have celiac like some people with Down syndrome.”
“That would have been a tragedy,” I said. People with celiac not only couldn’t eat anything with flour, but they couldn’t even be around it. “For all of us. We always sell out of Toby’s scones and crumpets.” Jenny nodded, and I didn’t add what I was thinking. It’s great for as long as it lasts.
I had been happy to make Toby the supplier of scones and crumpets, but once the place was sold, there would be no guarantees he could keep the gig. It bothered me to even think about it being taken away from him when it meant so much.
A simple trip that was supposed to last a week or two had turned into well over a month and counting. Fixing up the yarn area had been quick. I just had to get rid of the damaged yarn and do some cosmetic work and clean up the large room. Converting the old empty classroom into a tea room had been more of a job. The bones were there, but it needed painting and furnishings. The kitchen needed appliances and a spruce-up, but I was lucky to have found good help who worked fast, and it was all done in a few weeks.
Once the work was done, I put the property on the market and opened the whole school house for a couple of days to show proof of concept. I had gotten an offer, but it fell through.
I was advised that an open, thriving business would be easier to sell than a closed one and decided to extend my stay even longer.
There was also the promise of the influx of summer people. The town of Franklin was not on the water but only a short distance from Lake Michigan with miles of nice beaches and sand dunes. The school house was even closer to the Indiana Dunes National Park, and enclaves of summer homes like Heavenly Shores.
Until I had gone there, I had never thought much about the Great Lakes. I was all about the Pacific Ocean, and lakes seemed like inconsequential bodies of fresh water. Some people called the Great Lakes inland seas. Lake Michigan was shaped like a long finger, and this area was on the eastern bottom as it began to curve upward. The water could be calm, but storms could come out of nowhere with treacherous currents and waves big enough to surf on.
The miles of beaches and sand hills attracted people from Chicago and inland areas in Indiana. The summer season had begun and the tea room was becoming the draw that I had hoped for.
I definitely liked it here, but I was still anxious to sell the place so I could go back to my life in L.A.
I was an artist, and the retail job was a combination money maker and a favor to one of my talent agent father’s clients. When I say artist, most people think of painting or sculpting clay. I was sure my art school professors would be surprised to see the medium I had chosen to work in. I was a yarn artist, with most of it being crochet. To me, it was a form of sculpture. I created things like yarn cacti with crocheted dirt in terra-cotta-colored stitched pots. My favorite projects, though, were whimsical creatures like huggable teddy bears, unicorns and dolls. They weren’t exactly what you would show in an art gallery, but making them for our customers had become a side hustle at the Malibu kids’ boutique. One of my greatest joys was thinking that something I made was going to become part of a childhood memory and maybe even the toy that was like their blankie.
I smiled as Toby came out to get a second tray of scones. It had been my pleasure to increase the order. “These have blackberries I picked from back there,” he said, pointing to the wild area.
This time I followed him inside. The entrance hall had small rooms on either side that had been the girls’ and boys’ coat rooms in the distant past. It seemed funny now that the coat rooms should be separated by gender. I had turned one of them into a cashier area and small office. The other had a display of teas and tea-related items. There were also some small dolls and animals that I had crocheted, along with a sign reminding customers that we sold gift items and beach reads.
I started down the hall that led to the back of the building. To the right was the largest former classroom that was now devoted to yarn and everything that went with it. On the other side of the hall, a doorway led to the new tea room. I heard the bell over the door jangle, announcing the arrival of someone. Gray Hanover seemed harried as she caught up with me.
“I’m sorry, I overslept,” she said. She went right into explaining that she had a call with her mother in a few minutes. I followed her as she went into the larger room. “It’s a video call and I had to dress up,” Gray said. She was wearing ridiculously expensive jeans that were shredded around the knees. The shredding wasn’t from anything she had done, but rather a style thing that added to the cost. The gauzy top had a fancy label, and her blondish hair hung loose. “She’s going to notice that the color is off and tell me to get it done.” She reached up to pat her hair and started to fret that it was impossible to keep it perfectly smooth with the humidity. It was always like this when she had a call with her mother, and I wanted to calm things down if I could.
“Remember you are in your mid-twenties and an adult. She should be happy with how well you’re doing here and not so concerned about your appearance.”
At the same time, I was surveying the large room for anything that needed attention before the video call. Light was streaming in the tall windows on either side of the fireplace. I pushed a stray skein back into one of the cubbies and gathered scraps of yarn off the wood table we used for social yarn craft.
“I used that tube of lip plumper stuff so she wouldn’t notice how the injection is wearing off. I hope she appreciates it. That stuff really stings,” Gray said, pressing her lips together. I doubted that it would please her mother, as it didn’t come close to the look that seemed so popular. To me, it looked like someone had been punched in the mouth and their lips were swollen. I gave her a hug in support and let out a sigh.
Gray’s presence was a definite complication. How to explain our relationship? It was all about who her parents were. Her mother was Camille Constantine and her father Harry Hanover. Both of them were A-list stars, and my father, Bryan, was their agent. Beyond negotiating contracts for their latest projects, he was expected to help Camille deal with their life and family. Harry wasn’t a problem. He stayed in the background and let Camille run the show.
Yes, I called my father by his first name and had been helping him with his clients since I was a kid. It had really started when Camille wanted someone to help Gray with Girl Scouts. I joined the troop with her and helped her with badges and such. I was her companion when she went to camp and made sure the bathroom was clear of bears before she went in. It wasn’t some crazy imagining either. There was really a sign on the outside of the building warning there could be bears inside.
Camille had bought the fancy kids’ boutique in Malibu as a landing place for Gray when her attempts at modeling and acting hadn’t panned out. That was yet as far as Camille was concerned. She was convinced that with a few tweaks, her daughter could have a career. In the meantime, I had been called in to help in the store and to sort of look after Gray.
Gray had been shielded from dealing with normal things her whole life. There had been nannies, stylists, counselors and tutors along the way. The fact that she needed someone to join Girl Scouts to help her said it all.
I had always been a good kid, which meant accepting that I got pulled into my father’s work. It was probably hard for people outside the entertainment business to understand, but agents like my father had professional and personal involvement with their clients. Bryan was expected to do more than just negotiate contracts and deal with getting his clients work. He had to deal with their personal lives and situations that cropped up. Even silly things like needing last-minute cupcakes for a school bake sale. I was the one to take care of that.
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Thank you to Betty Hechtman for visiting Salty Inspirations and sharing this fun character guest post from Gray Hanover. If Sconed to Death sounds like a book you’d enjoy, be sure to add it to your TBR and check out the purchase links above.
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As always, thanks for stopping by for some Salty Inspirations! —Michelle❤️
