Former Port Washington Author’s Novel Has A Local Twist

PORT WASHINGTON, NY — Mystery author MJ Miller grew up in Port Washington admiring Execution Rocks lighthouse on Long Island Sound from the shore, and as a child, she wasn’t quite as tuned into its history, as she was the stories spun about it, or the others she imagined.

“It was a fixture — it was always there,” Miller said of the island, which is located between Sands Point and New Rochelle, and how she viewed it from a child’s perspective. “It was creepy when the fog would come. You always had little stories in the back of your head.”

As Miller grew older, she learned of the island’s deep history, and it piqued her interest.

“Once I learned the true history of the horrors of the picturesque beacon, it haunted me. I've wanted to write about it for a long time,” she said.

Miller, who was formerly known as Mary Schiller in her youth, was inspired by the lighthouse to write her third novel, "Phantom of Execution Rocks,” which spins a yarn about the fictitious Port Newton and tackles the mysterious history of its lighthouse, while weaving in some modern romance.

Miller said she was able to build on her fascination about the island after an experience she had on a Sunfish sailboat when she became stuck in the water just after a rainstorm, and she saw a barge moving through the mist toward her.

“I have always remembered that feeling of seeing that barge come through that mist,” she said.

Execution Rocks’ location is said to have been used as a spot where the British Navy would tie Revolutionary War soldiers and wait for the high tide to come in and drown them, the New York Post reported. Other accounts say that slaveholders used the location to punish their slaves, according to a Wikipedia post.

Before his execution, serial killer Carl Panzram confessed that he broke into the William H. Taft mansion and used money from the burglary to purchase a yacht that he used to lure men to so that he could rape and murder them. The account, which was published in a posthumous biography, “Killer: A Journal of Murder,” claims he unloaded the lifeless bodies of 10 men into the sound near the lighthouse.

Miller said that growing up she learned of rumors that the island and its surrounding area was part of a maritime Underground Railroad along the coastline. There were also tales of pirates, and bootleggers. Millers’s own mother had told her that bootleggers used the island to run booze during prohibition and a body once washed up on the shore nearby, she said.

“Everybody has a story about the whole area,” Miller said.

The lighthouse, commissioned in 1847, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2007.

Execution Rocks has fostered enough fascination over the years that it even sparked a visit by Ghost Adventures, a group of people who investigate supernatural phenomenon, and the episode was featured on the Travel Channel.

Miller, an Arizona resident who graduated from Paul D. Schreiber High School, took up writing after a career in marketing and advertising. Her previous works include, “All About Annie” and “The Christoph Curse.” She recently signed a five-book deal with Scarsdale Publishing in New York, and her latest novel, “Secrets & Lies: A Luckland Ladies Mysteries,” is set to hit bookstores this year.

Miller says that she was inspired to write novels after having been surrounded by an entertaining collection of masterful storytelling-matriarchs in her family — women who could spin a yarn better than anyone. One of her great aunts was a chorus girl in the big band era, and she shared many stories about her experiences in show business, Miller said.

Miller’s family would gather at her childhood home over thanksgiving or summer barbecues, and she would hear the most fantastic tales from her great aunts as she sat on their knee.

“If you got them alone — the tales they would tell were extraordinary,” she said.

Miller’s “Phantom of Execution Rocks” features several variations of the history surrounding the island, she said. In the novel, protagonist Luce Porter, a former reporter turned news producer, teams up with an "annoyingly attractive” police detective who conveniently pops into her life when she least expects it, according to Miller.

The novel is sort of a sequel to “All about Annie,” as it follows the previous protagonist’s sister, Luce, whom readers were left wondering about, Miller said.

But, Miller, however, shied away from revealing any of the plot twists of her latest book, in true mystery writer fashion.

“They have a history together,” she said, adding that Porter previously “dealt” with the policeman and they “both have a history with reporting the ship that they see.”

While the pair do discover secrets that have not been revealed for centuries, they also do not fully solve the mystery they are investigating, Miller said.

“I like to let the reader decide ultimately,” she added.

"Phantom of Execution Rocks" and Miller's other works can be found on Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Apple Books, Rakuten kobo, and Bookshop. To learn more about the author and her books, go to www.authormjmiller.com.