"The Fourth Consort"

Edward Ashton is the author of the novels The Fourth Consort, Mal Goes to War, Antimatter Blues, Mickey7 (now a motion picture directed by Bong Joon-ho and starring Robert Pattinson), Three Days in April, and The End of Ordinary. He lives in upstate New York in a cabin in the woods (not that Cabin in the Woods) with his wife, a nine pound killing machine named Maggie, and the world’s only purebred ratrantula, where he writes—mostly fiction, occasionally fact—under the watchful eyes of a giant woodpecker and a rotating cast of barred owls. In his free time, he enjoys cancer research, teaching quantum physics to sullen graduate students, and whittling.

Ashton applied the Page 69 Test to The Fourth Consort and reported the following:

Page 69 of The Fourth Consort finds our protagonist, Dalton Greaves, contemplating a job offer he's just received from the representatives of Unity, an interstellar confederation dedicated to finding budding sentient life wherever it arises, and guiding it away from self-destruction and onto the path of peace and enlightenment.

That's what they told him, anyway. A quick internet search reveals that the few stories out there from people who have signed on with Unity and returned don't seem to have much to do with enlightenment. Seems like the humans Unity takes are mostly being used for either scut work or something that sounds suspiciously like plunder:

A man from the Netherlands claimed to have spent ten years doing equipment maintenance on an ammie ship without ever seeing the surface of a planet. A Korean woman said she'd been taken to an administrative center somewhere on a world with no moon and a fat red sun that never budged from its place on the southern horizon, where she provided cultural context to ammie researchers wading through ten thousand years of human literature looking for something worth replicating. Someone going by the handle Anger Man claimed to have participated in what sounded like a research study into the mechanics of human reproduction.

That one didn't sound so bad.

A reader browsing to page 69 would actually get a reasonably good idea of the setup of the book. The Fourth Consort is a twist on the old trope of humanity joining a benevolent galactic civilization. In particular, it wonders how that might play out if the civilization actually isn't actually all the benevolent--more than that, what if there is a benevolent civilization out there, but we've inadvertently signed on with a criminal gang? Because this page lays out Dalton's thinking as he considers Unity's offer, it gives a fair overview of the premise.

What we don't get at all from this page, however, is a feel for the characters, the tone, or any idea of the details of the plot. The Fourth Consort is heavy on snappy dialogue and interesting, conflicted characters, with a heavy dose of dark comedy. Because this page is really all about filling in the background, we don't get any of that here. We also don't learn much of anything about Dalton himself, and much of the focus of the book is on his journey up from a very grim place in small town West Virginia to a slightly less grim place in the cosmos.

Bottom line for me is that while you could do worse than this page if you were looking to determine what this book is all about, you could definitely do better. I might suggest pages 114-115 as better representatives. Bob and Randall are the real unsung heroes here.

Visit Edward Ashton's website.

The Page 69 Test: Mickey7.

Q&A with Edward Ashton.

The Page 69 Test: Antimatter Blues.

Writers Read: Edward Ashton (March 2023).

The Page 69 Test: Mal Goes to War.

Writers Read: Edward Ashton (April 2024).

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Drowning Game"

Barbara Nickless is the Wall Street Journal and Amazon Charts bestselling author of Play of Shadows, Dark of Night, and At First Light in the Dr. Evan Wilding series, as well as the Sydney Rose Parnell series, which includes Blood on the Tracks, a Suspense Magazine Best of 2016 selection and winner of the Colorado Book Award and the Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence; Dead Stop, winner of the Colorado Book Award and nominee for the Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence; Ambush; and Gone to Darkness. Her essays and short stories have appeared in Writer’s Digest and on Criminal Element, among other markets. She lives in Colorado, where she loves to cave, snowshoe, hike, and drink single malt Scotch―usually not at the same time.

Nickless applied the Page 69 Test to her latest novel, The Drowning Game, and reported the following:

In The Drowning Game, Nadia and Cassandra Brenner are the heirs to a prestigious yacht-building firm. Cass is in Singapore overseeing a build for a Chinese billionaire when she falls to her death from the 40th floor of one of the word’s most expensive hotels. In the novel, page 69 offers only a glimpse into the novel’s themes of betrayal, treachery, and family secrets. The page is focused on Nadia’s decision to look into her sister’s unexpected death—be it suicide, an accident, or murder. We get a few leads on this page as to where Nadia’s investigation might take her in Singapore: an astrologist Cass was apparently seeing (even though she didn’t believe in astrology or fortune telling), secretive behavior by Cass’s assistant, and an invitation to dinner from the man hired to handle security for the almost finished yacht. While this page offers only a small peek into the avenues Nadia will explore, she is haunted by her father’s advice, which will stay with her throughout the novel: “Trust no one."

Visit Barbara Nickless's website.

The Page 69 Test: At First Light.

Q&A with Barbara Nickless.

The Page 69 Test: Play of Shadows.

Writers Read: Barbara Nickless.

--Marshal Zeringue

"We Are Watching"

USA Today and international bestselling author Alison Gaylin has won the Edgar and Shamus awards. Her work has been published in the US, UK, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Japan, Germany, Romania and Denmark, and she has been nominated for numerous awards, including the Macavity, Anthony, ITW Thriller and Strand Book Award. In addition to her novels, she has published many short stories and collaborated with Megan Abbott on the graphic novel Normandy Gold.

Gaylin applied the Page 69 Test to her latest novel, We Are Watching, and reported the following:

At the start of page 69, We Are Watching’s Meg Russo is trying to balance some heavy emotions – the enduring grief over her husband’s death in a car accident that she believes herself responsible for, a lack of connection with her 18-year-old daughter, Lily, who has become increasingly distant in her grief, and the stress of reopening her bookstore for the first time since the accident. Overshadowing everything though, is the fact that her employee, Sara Beth, has told Meg that her estranged father Nathan Lerner has called, and she needs to call him back. It brings back some unpleasant memories:

Meg was a senior in high school when her mother when her mother died from MRSA, which she most likely contracted when she cut herself on a thorn in their rose garden. Mom and especially Dad were distrustful of modern medicine, so by the time they realized she was suffering from something that couldn’t be cured with nettles or dandelion tea, it was already too late. The antibiotics wouldn’t take. Meg came home from school to a note that read, Mom’s in intensive care, and days later, her beloved mother was gone. Meg was shell-shocked. That was the only way to describe it. As though a bomb had gone off inside her, turning her heart to ash.

She received no comfort from Nathan. Lost in his own grief, he locked himself in his studio every day, smoking ashtrays full of joints and reciting the Kaddish again and again and again. He grew increasingly paranoid, babbling about religious zealots plotting Shira’s death, some secret cabal of anti-Semites that hated rock and roll. They murdered her! he’d shout late at night from the other end of the house as Meg tried to get to sleep. Not caring whom he frightened into hours of insomnia. It’s Kennedy all over again!

Reading this page, I was surprised at how much it sums up both Nathan’s character and one of the central relationships of the book – that of Meg and Nathan, whose arc toward understanding and trusting each other is essential to the plot. It also alludes to the question that drives the suspense in the book: Is Nathan as paranoid as Meg believes him to be – or is there really a “secret cabal” out to get him and his family? Throughout the rest of the book, the latter proves increasingly true. And Meg finds herself questioning the motivations of nearly everyone around her – including friends and neighbors she’s known for years. Meanwhile, Nathan learns to better understand his daughter and granddaughter – and how his own overarching grief and self- absorption has kept him from protecting them against a very real evil. Throughout the book, Meg and Nathan’s growing understanding of each other – and of the forces out to get them – becomes the one thing that can possibly save their lives. Will either of them take action before it’s too late?

Learn more about the book and author at Alison Gaylin's website.

The Page 69 Test: Into the Dark.

The Page 69 Test: What Remains of Me.

The Page 69 Test: If I Die Tonight.

The Page 69 Test: The Collective.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Fagin the Thief"

Allison Epstein earned her MFA in fiction from Northwestern University and a BA in creative writing from the University of Michigan. A Michigan native, she now lives in Chicago, where she enjoys good theater, bad puns, and fancy jackets.

Epstein is the author of historical novels including A Tip for the Hangman, Let the Dead Bury the Dead, and Fagin the Thief.

Epstein applied the Page 69 Test to Fagin the Thief and reported the following::

From page 69:

He ought to have left the first stone at her grave, ought to have sat shiva in their empty flat for seven days. So much he ought to have done, but what does any of it matter? His mother is already gone. Everyone who ever cared for Jacob has left him. It’s his turn to leave now, if leaving will keep him alive. Better to cut his losses and care for himself, because this is the price that must be paid when someone else cares for you, the searing, ever-expanding pain when they inevitably disappear. Iron hearts can’t break. It’s a lesson he will remember.

This paragraph from page 69 is one of the core moments in Fagin the Thief that show my character Jacob Fagin developing his maladaptive worldview. This is literally the paragraph where all of his problems start, and they will mess him up and make him worse for every moment of the novel that remains. So well done, Page 69 Test! A+.

In this moment, Jacob is sixteen years old, and his mother Leah has just died. Up until this moment, she was the only person in the world who cared for him unconditionally. His father died before he was born, and though he has friends in his corner of London, these are largely transactional relationships. Leah is the only person who cared about Jacob because of who he was, not because of his luck or skill or talent as a pickpocket and troublemaker.

Following her death, Jacob decides no one will ever get that close to him again, because the pain of their inevitable abandonment isn’t worth the comfort that comes before. But this will turn out to be easier said than done. He’s only human, and though intellectually he knows the risks of being vulnerable, there’s still something in the animal part of him that wants to connect, to be seen.

After this paragraph, Jacob sets off on his own. What happens to take him from this moment of decision to the ringleader of a gang of child thieves we all know from Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens? Well, that would be telling…

Visit Allison Epstein's website.

My Book, The Movie: A Tip for the Hangman.

The Page 69 Test: A Tip for the Hangman.

Q&A with Allison Epstein.

My Book, The Movie: Let the Dead Bury the Dead.

The Page 69 Test: Let the Dead Bury the Dead.

Writers Read: Allison Epstein (October 2023).

Writers Read: Allison Epstein.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Not Who We Expected"

As a forensic scientist at the Cuyahoga County Coroner’s Office, New York Times bestselling author Lisa Black analyzed gunshot residue on hands and clothing, hairs, fibers, paint, glass, DNA, and blood as well as other forms of trace evidence. Now she is a Certified Crime Scene Analyst and Certified Latent Print Examiner and for the Cape Coral Police Department in Florida. Black is a member of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, the International Association for Identification, and the International Association of Bloodstain Pattern Analysts. She has testified in court as an expert witness and served as a consultant for CourtTV.

She is the author of the Locard Institute series and of the highly acclaimed Gardiner & Renner series, for which she was nominated for the Sue Grafton Memorial Award. Her books have been translated into six languages.

Black applied the Page 69 Test to the fourth title in the Locard Institute series, Not Who We Expected, and reported the following:

This test doesn’t work well for this book. In Not Who We Expected, the Locard Forensic Institute is hired by rock legend Billy Diamond, who is himself in the throes of a vital comeback tour (as well as several illegal substances). Billy’s daughter Devon left college for the summer and never returned after a career development retreat in the Nevada desert turned into her new home. When the boyfriend who accompanied her turns up dead, Billy wants eyes on his daughter without appearing to hover. Former FBI agent and new Locard professor Ellie Carr is dispatched to said desert to find some answers—and she does. But they come with new and ominous questions.

On page 69, Ellie’s long day at the ranch is drawing to a close. But instead of turning in with her fellow attendees, she moves a few yards out into the night to make a surreptitious phone call to her boss, Dr. Rachael Davies. As she’s cursing the elusive cell service signal, a young man materializes out of the dark. He tells her phone service is a fruitless pursuit, but later Ellie will realize that her fear was not misplaced. The young man’s job is to make sure the attendees/recruits/victims at the ranch stay in line—by whatever means necessary.

But if a browsing reader checked out the book only by reading page 69, which hops from the busywork to frustration with technology to Ellie being startled—these things might seem too random without the rest of the book to show why all three short incidents are important to Ellie, to Devon, and to their survival.

Visit Lisa Black's website.

The Page 69 Test: That Darkness.

My Book, The Movie: Unpunished.

The Page 69 Test: Unpunished.

My Book, The Movie: Perish.

The Page 69 Test: Perish.

The Page 69 Test: Suffer the Children.

Writers Read: Lisa Black (July 2020).

The Page 69 Test: Every Kind of Wicked.

Q&A with Lisa Black.

My Book, The Movie: What Harms You.

The Page 69 Test: What Harms You.

My Book, The Movie: The Deepest Kill.

My Book, The Movie: Not Who We Expected.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Mulligan Curse"

Diane Barnes is the author of All We Could Still Have, More Than, Waiting for Ethan, and Mixed Signals. She is also a product market manager in the health-care industry. When she’s not writing, Barnes can be found at the gym, running or playing tennis, trying to burn off the ridiculous amounts of chocolate and ice cream she eats. She and her husband, Steven, live in New England with Oakley, their handsome golden retriever

Barnes applied the Page 69 Test to her latest novel, The Mulligan Curse, and reported the following:

On page 69 of The Mulligan Curse, Mary goes to work as a television news reporter for the first time as her 24-year-old self. This is her dream job and she’s excited. However, because she’s just dropped into her new life as her younger self, she has no knowledge of what’s happening at work or what she’s supposed to do. For most of the page, she’s confused and desperately trying to figure out what’s going on. Late on the page, Mary gets a memory dump that helps her acclimate to her new reality.

The Page 69 Test doesn’t work for this book. If a reader randomly opened The Mulligan Curse to page 69, they would be as confused as Mary. They wouldn’t understand that just a few pages before, Mary was a 54-year-old unhappy housewife. Nor would they understand that The Mulligan Curse isn’t a time travel story so Mary doesn’t have old memories to help her adjust to her new life.

Of course, what happens on this page is essential to the story. It helps to show Mary’s discomfort in her new, young life, and the discomfort Mary feels is important to the change she undergoes throughout the book.

Visit Diane Barnes's website.

Q&A with Diane Barnes.

The Page 69 Test: All We Could Still Have.

My Book, The Movie: All We Could Still Have.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Low April Sun"

Constance Squires holds a Ph.D. in English from Oklahoma State University and teaches Creative Writing at the University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond. Her latest novel is Low April Sun. She is the author of the novels Along the Watchtower, which won the 2012 Oklahoma Book Award for Fiction, Live from Medicine Park, a 2018 Oklahoma Book Award finalist named in Electric Literature as one of the "Seven Candidates for the Great American Rock and Roll Novel," and the short story collection Hit Your Brights. Her short stories have appeared in Guernica, The Atlantic Monthly, Shenandoah, Identity Theory, Bayou, the Dublin Quarterly, This Land, and a number of other magazines.

Squires applied the Page 69 Test to Low April Sun and reported the following:

Page 69 of Low April Sun finds one of the main characters, Edie Ash, in the earlier of the two timelines in the book. It's April 19, 1995, and she, a young waitress driving home on the day of the Murrah Bombing in Oklahoma City, is sitting at an intersection in the rain when President Clinton's speech addressing the bombing comes on the air. She looks around and realizes that all of the people in the other cars at the intersection are weeping, as she is.

I wouldn't say page 69 encapsulates the whole book, but it does capture some important elements. What it doesn't do is give a sense of the other timeline, 2015 during the week of the twenty-year anniversary of the bombing and the Oklahoma Geological Survey's confirmation that the 200+ earthquakes shaking the area per day are in all likelihood caused by fracking, or the other significant characters with stories in both timelines, or even the plot of the book, but it does provide a good reaction shot of a main character on the day of the bombing, and a sense that the impact of the disaster on the larger community is a focus of the book, which it is. There are a few isolated places in the book where I'm pulling from my own memories of being in Oklahoma City that day, and this page is one of them. It's one of the core memories that gave rise to the story. Sitting in my car in the rain watching everyone in the other cars listening to Clinton speak and weeping openly was one of the moments when a layer of shock peeled off and I was aware of being in an unbelievable day. The character, Edie, is noticing with a little shame how the devastation gives rise to atavistic responses and primitive thoughts in her, like a willingness to be consoled by a leader, a need for justice, and even the sense that the rain seems like nature reacting to all the deaths. That interiority is characteristic of the voice, and a focus on the environment as an active part of the story, almost a character, is, too.

Visit Constance E. Squires's website.

My Book, The Movie: Low April Sun.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Into the Fall"

Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Tamara L. Miller earned her PhD in Canadian history before embarking on a career working for the federal government. Miller began as a doe-eyed policy analyst and eventually moved into an executive role with the Government of Canada. She later left public service, older and perhaps a little wiser, to become a writer. Miller is past president of Ottawa Independent Writers and has written several articles published online by the likes of CBC and Ottawa Life Magazine.

Over the years, the author has called many Canadian cities home but now lives in Ottawa with her family and two long-suffering cats. She’s always been fascinated by the raw beauty of the wilder places in the world and escapes to them whenever possible.

Miller applied the Page 69 Test to her first novel, Into the Fall, and reported the following:

Well, I’ll be! Page 69 of Into the Fall turns out to be an early glimpse into the layered personality of the main character, Sarah Anderson. Though only half a page, it’s the first time readers see a hint of the cutting edge that Sarah tries to hide from the world.

Sarah seems to have it all—family, kids, career. But when her husband, Matthew, disappears while on a family camping trip, leaving her stranded with their two children, the cracks in Sarah’s perfect life are brought into the light. Under the scrutiny of a suspicious police offer, Sarah reconnects with her estranged sister, Izzy, who claws at the surface to reveal Sarah isn’t always the person she pretends to be, and she has secrets.

On page 69, Izzy coaxes a long-hidden story from their childhood that speaks to the lengths Sarah will go to in order to right perceived wrongs. Since it’s only a partial page, I’ve kept the entire quote:

Sarah kept her face unyielding and her secrets wrapped tight despite her sister’s mock-stern glare. “She—I heard she ran into a few problems, that’s all.”

Rumors had started circulating about Angie. Drips here and there—social arsenic in the stew of teenage angst.

“I may have said a thing or two about her that got out,” Sarah told her sister.

None of it could be verified, of course. But it was enough to fuel the rumor mill. Did Angie really sleep with Daisy Schneider while she was dating Steve Isaacs, the soccer team captain? Was Angie selling pot and uppers out of her locker after school? Never anything concrete, but enough to get people wondering, talking, and sidestepping Angie in the halls. The specifics were left up to adolescent imagination. When the Principal’s impromptu locker search had turned up a baggie in Angie’s locker, no one was surprised.

“It was time she got a taste of her own medicine,” Sarah said.

“Well color me surprised! I had no idea you had that in you?” Izzy said, a look of genuine admiration crossing her face.

“I don’t like bullies.”

Izzy is the mirror through which Sarah starts to see herself and her past. This scene showcases a central relationship in the book. So, I’d say the Page 69 Test is spot on.

Visit Tamara L. Miller's website.

My Book, The Movie: Into the Fall.

Q&A with Tamara L. Miller.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Killing Plains"

Sherry Rankin grew up in New Jersey where she became an early and avid reader of mystery fiction. She earned undergraduate and graduate degrees in English and currently lives in Abilene, Texas where she has taught writing and literature at a local university for twenty years.

She has written scholarly articles and worked as an editorial consultant, manuscript reader and ghostwriter, but her avocation has always been creative writing.

Her novel, Strange Fire, was shortlisted for the 2017 Daniel Goldsmith First Novel Prize and won the 2017 CWA Debut Dagger Award.

Rankin applied the Page 69 Test to her debut thriller, The Killing Plains, and reported the following:

The Killing Plains is about Colly Newland, a former Houston detective, who has returned to her late husband’s home town in rural West Texas to solve a murder of which his brother has been accused.

Once there, she finds herself faced with a baffling sequence of killings that she feels morally bound to solve in order to move on with her life.

Colly is grieving a serious personal loss and is rife with inner conflict: she’s a gifted detective who has abandoned law enforcement; she’s widowed and lonely, but not emotionally ready for a new relationship; she has deep regrets about her own failings as a mother and is trying to compensate by parenting her traumatized young grandson; she feels she owes a moral debt to her late husband’s family, but she is repulsed by their wealth and entitlement and wants to cut ties with them once that debt is paid.

Page 69 occurs in the middle of a pivotal chapter in the novel. It takes place at a fireworks stand beside a bleak, lonely West Texas highway. Colly has just found a crucial clue; she has also just faced her first serious setback in the case and discovered, to her horror, that the killer is actively interfering with her investigation in a creepy and unsettling way.

On page 69, Earla Cobb, forensic specialist for the county, shows up on her motorcycle to examine the scene. Page 69 also highlights Colly’s struggle to balance the needs of her grandson, Satchel, with her professional responsibilities—a theme that runs throughout the novel.

While I’m not sure anyone would buy the book on the strength of page 69 alone, it definitely does come at a key plot point and depicts some of the central themes and motifs of the book.

Visit Sherry Rankin's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Killing Plains.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Miranda Conspiracy"

James Cambias has been nominated for the James Tiptree Jr. Award and the 2001 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer.

He applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, The Miranda Conspiracy, and reported the following:

My new novel The Miranda Conspiracy is a far-future political thriller set inside and around Uranus's moon Miranda. It's a direct sequel to my first "Billion Worlds" book, The Godel Operation, and follows the main characters from that story. The sarcastic AI Daslakh accompanies its human best friend Zee, and Adya Elso, the woman Zee has fallen in love with, back to her home world Miranda, where her parents are part of the exclusive plutocratic ruling class known as the Sixty Families. They travel aboard Pelagia, a spaceship with an uplifted orca brain who is a bit of an adrenaline junkie.

In the ocean under Miranda's icy crust, the three of them must face spies, gangsters, mercenaries, and the biggest threat of all: Adya's family. Her parents want Adya to marry for money in order to preserve their position, and Zee has nothing to offer but his own good nature. Adya and Zee try to solve the crisis facing Adya's family and get drawn into deeper and deeper layers of intrigue.

I don't think page 69 of The Miranda Conspiracy is a good indication of what the book is like. The page is split between two scenes. On the top half, Zee and Daslakh are discussing a little of Miranda's history and Zee reaffirms his vow to recover the incredibly valuable cargo payload inbound from the Oort Cloud, which Adya's great-grandmother left to her, but which got sold off when her parents were scrambling to repay debts.

On the bottom half of the page, Adya and Zee are at dinner with Adya's parents, and Adya brings up the possibility that the family's financial difficulties might be the result of a deliberate attack by some hostile party. Her father also mentions the divisive political issue of the Cryoglyphs — ancient ice carvings from the early days of Miranda exploration, thousands of years earlier — and how his desire to protect them has cut him off from the possibility of financial aid from the other members of the ruling coalition.

By themselves, these two snippets seem a bit trivial, and we certainly don't see any of the underwater chases, space battles, or sneaking around that liven up the book's action. However, both segments are laying track for some major developments. Zee's drive to recover the Oort payload for Adya — and thereby save the family's fortunes and win her parents' approval — will lead him through a series of encounters in Miranda's oligarch class and underworld, which in turn will put Daslakh in position to recognize the real author of the Elso family's problems.

Meanwhile Adya's investigation of the forces opposing her father put her in touch with revolutionaries who want to overthrow the existing oligarchy, Miranda's police service, and her airheaded sister's fanatical fans. In the end, the two plot lines intersect in a coup and invasion.

In effect, page 69 is about the point at which the situation has been established, the scene set, and the plot begins accelerating down the runway to takeoff.

Visit James L. Cambias's website.

My Book, The Movie: A Darkling Sea.

Writers Read: James L. Cambias (January 2019).

My Book, The Movie: Arkad's World.

The Page 69 Test: Arkad's World.

My Book, The Movie: The Godel Operation.

Q&A with James L. Cambias.

The Page 69 Test: The Godel Operation.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Wagtail Murder Club"

New York Times bestselling mystery author Krista Davis writes three mystery series: the Domestic Diva Mysteries; the Paws & Claws Mysteries; and the Pen & Ink Mysteries.

Davis resided in Northern Virginia for many years and lived for a time in Old Town, Alexandria. Today she lives with an assortment of dogs and cats in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia.

She applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, The Wagtail Murder Club, and reported the following:

From page 69:

“Bizzy Bloom,” I said. “I have to hand it to her. She’s very stylish. Not runway-model fashionable. More comfortable chic. Her son is Logan Verlice, the bartender over at Tequila Mockingbird.”

“Really?” said Oma. “I must meet her. He is a fine young man.”

“You mentioned Ella?” said Dave.

“She’s married to Wendell Walters,” said Mom. “I think she’s quite a bit younger than Wendell. She was in a terrible car accident recently and came here to be with her husband directly from the hospital, which I thought sort of odd. If it were me, I would have gone home and told my husband I would see him when he got back.”

“Hmm. Some serious devotion there,” said Mr. Huckle.

“And she’s afraid of big black dogs,” I added. “But I think Squishy may have won her over.”

Squishy raised his head at the sound of his name.

“Oh!” Oma perked up. “Is she an adoption candidate?

I shrugged. “Maybe!”

“Is that it?” asked Dave.

“As far as I know.”

“So here’s my plan. Ben is our best source of information because he’s part of this group. He knows them. But— ” he raised his forefinger “— Ben has a vested interest, so he’s not entirely reliable. And I have to consider him a suspect.”

“You mean because he wants them to open an office and give him the job of working here?” asked Mom. “He wouldn’t kill anyone for that.”

Dave scoffed. “People have murdered for less than that. Holly, I need access to Dinah’s room, please. And I need you to hang out with Ben and infiltrate the group.”

I think page 69 reflects the nature of the book. They’re talking about possible suspects. And Dave, the local cop in this very small town, needs Holly’s connection to Ben, her former boyfriend, to get to know them better and find out what she can.

The page includes three members of the Wagtail Murder Club. Holly and her grandmother (Oma) own the Sugar Maple Inn where most of the suspects are staying. The victim was an attorney, so the killer is most likely a member of the law firm where the victim worked or one of their spouses. It could be a townsperson, but it’s logical of Dave to pursue her work colleagues first.

Names are mentioned here, so it would be easier to follow if one read from the beginning. But, good news! I always have a list of characters at the beginning of my books.

Visit Krista Davis's website.

Coffee with a canine: Krista Davis & Han, Buttercup, and Queenie.

The Page 69 Test: The Ghost and Mrs. Mewer.

The Page 69 Test: Murder, She Barked.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Sun's Shadow"

Sejal Badani is the Amazon Charts, USA Today, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of The Storyteller’s Secret and Trail of Broken Wings. She is also a Goodreads Best Fiction award and ABC/Disney Writing Fellowship finalist whose work has been published in over fifteen languages. When not writing, she loves reading and traveling. Bruce Springsteen, Beyoncé, and Ed Sheeran are always playing in the background.

Badani applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, The Sun's Shadow, and reported the following:

Page 69 offers an emotionally charged snapshot of the novel, encapsulating a pivotal moment that defines the story’s central themes. It captures the aftermath of devastating news—Celine and Eric learning that their son, Brian, has cancer. Celine hesitates, paralyzed by a desperate hope that the diagnosis might somehow prove to be a mistake, a fleeting nightmare she can wake from. She wrestles with her own denial, longing to shield Brian from the painful reality for just a moment longer. Eric, however, insists that Brian deserves honesty, no matter how painful. This clash b

etween avoidance and confrontation not only highlights the differences in their coping mechanisms but also exposes cracks in their relationship.

The narrative delves into Celine’s internal monologue, revealing how this moment forces her to confront wounds from her own childhood. Raised amidst conflict and instability, Celine reflects on the contrast between her tumultuous upbringing and Eric’s idyllic childhood. It is this very contrast that once drew her to him, as though falling in love with Eric allowed her to vicariously experience the stability and warmth she always longed for. However, this dynamic now adds tension to their marriage, as their differing approaches to parenting and coping with trauma create a growing emotional distance between them.

Brian’s diagnosis becomes the novel’s central conflict, serving as a catalyst for transformation in both the family dynamic and the broader narrative arc. Although page 69 is brief—closing out a chapter—it carries immense weight. The scene offers a raw and unfiltered look at the family’s struggles, balancing heartache with moments of introspection.

If a new reader were to pick up the book and turn to this page, it would serve as a powerful introduction to the story’s emotional stakes. While its brevity and lack of broader context may limit its ability to fully represent the novel as a whole, it undoubtedly hooks the reader. It offers just enough to compel them to keep reading, eager to uncover how this family navigates the immense challenges ahead.

Visit Sejal Badani's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Sejal Badani & Skyler.

My Book, The Movie: The Storyteller's Secret.

Q&A with Sejal Badani.

--Marshal Zeringue