Summer time in Maine can often be hazy, hot and humid, and a good mystery is just the thing to indulge in while sitting in the shade, sipping iced tea.

Some wonderful whodunit writers vacation or live right here in Maine, and the Scarborough Public Library brought three of them together for a lively discussion a few weeks ago in a program entitled “It’s a Mystery to Me.”

Kate Flora, a lawyer and a former assistant attorney general for Maine, is the author of the Thea Kojak series. Thea lives in Massachusetts, but her boyfriend is a detective with the Maine State Police who plays a major role in every story. Thea herself is a consultant for private schools, a troubleshooter and problem solver, and often the problems she tackles seem to be of the murderous type! Flora also has written a true-crime novel, “Finding Amy: A True Story of Murder in Maine.”

If you are interested in prints, particularly antique prints, you should be sure to read the mysteries by Lea Wait. Her heroine, Maggie Summer, runs such a business and every chapter starts with a description of a particular piece of paper, perhaps a lithograph or engraving, whose subject hints at what will occur next in the story. Maggie also has a boyfriend, Will Brewer, an antique dealer in tools, and the reader often glimpses what it is like to participate in antique shows taking place up and down the East Coast. As an added complication to her love life, Maggie, who is single, yearns to adopt a child, but boyfriend Will is hesitant. In real life, Wait, while single, adopted four Asian children. She is now married and lives in Maine.

History lovers should appreciate mysteries by Leslie Wheeler, author of “Murder at Plimoth Plantation” and “Murder at Gettysburg.” Her heroine, Miranda Lewis, writes history textbooks for a living (as does Wheeler), but enjoys serving as a history interpreter in her spare time. She becomes an amateur detective when fellow history enactors die mysteriously. Her latest book is “Mystery at Mystic.”

If it is a hazy, hot and humid day, splendid place to spend some time is at Spring Point in South Portland. Sit on the benches that line the shore and savor the breezes off the water while watching tugboats guide tankers up to the dock at Portland Pipe Line. Admire the Casco Bay Ferries, chugging back and forth between the islands, or envy the tourists on board the lovely sailing vessels, the Bagheera and the Wendameen. Perhaps you may even see a huge cruise ship glide past Spring Point Ledge Lighthouse. If you choose a Saturday for your excursion, you can visit the lighthouse, climbing up the ladders to the very top for a spectacular view of the harbor.

Portland Harbor Museum is also located at Spring Point and has a fascinating exhibit this summer and fall entitled “Picturing Portland: A Century of Change.” Images have been selected from the museum’s Angell Collection of glass plate negatives, dating from about 1900, and then paired with present-day photos taken as much as possible from the same spot and same angle.

One of the most interesting pairs portrays the Milk Street Armory. Visible in the 1898 picture is the armory, constructed by the Maine National Guard just a few years earlier. A parade, sending troops off to the Spanish-American War, can be seen marching down the street. In the present-day photo, the armory looks almost exactly the same – the caption tells us that this historic building was scheduled to be torn down in the 1960s to provide waterfront parking, but instead it became the Portland Regency Hotel in 1987 and so was preserved for many years to come.

One of the saddest pairs depicts the birthplace of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, a handsome home on the corner of Fore and Hancock streets with a gorgeous view of the harbor that inspired so many of Longfellow’s poems. In 1954, the building was torn down. Only a flagpole and bronze plaque mark the spot. At the moment, this neighborhood is run-down and decrepit, but redevelopment is at hand, and hotels, retail shops and parking garages may appear soon in a future photograph.

Members of the Scarborough Garden Club have been taking advantage of the summer days. The annual plant sale was held at the Hunnewell House on the first Saturday in June. This major fundraising event provides for operating expenses of the club and, thanks to the organizational skills of Doreen Whitney, it was a great success. On another perfect June day, about 25 members participated in the annual field trip. This year the destination was the Inn by the Sea. Head gardener, Derrick Daly, was a superb guide, enthusiastic, incredibly knowledgeable and very conscious of protecting the environment. He told us that he uses almost no chemicals; instead, he relies on heavy composting and natural enemies to control pests. We admired an incredible selection of perennials, shrubs and trees including tea roses, holly hocks, hot pink spirea, bleeding hearts, rugosa roses, yellow potentilla, crab apple trees, star magnolias, river birch and weeping cutleaf Japanese maple.

As we reached the end of our visit, he pointed out the Japanese knotweed climbing up the banks that separate the grounds of the inn from Crescent Beach State Park. Highly invasive, it is a ceaseless threat to the gardens and only constant mowing keeps it under control. After the tour, members continued on to the stunning gardens of Joan McDougall for a picnic and business meeting.

Finally, on July 21, the Scarborough Garden Club, under the highly competent leadership of Barbara Zaharis, sponsored its first town-wide Garden Tour. Ten properties were featured, including three on Lillian Way, two on Kirkwood Road, two at Higgins Beach and one each on Running Hill Road, Clearwater Drive and Iron Clad Road. Participation was excellent, not only from Scarborough residents but also with many visitors coming from surrounding towns, All proceeds from this event, which members plan to offer every other year, will go into the club’s scholarship fund, providing aid to a Scarborough college student majoring in some form of agriculture or environmental studies.