He applied the Page 69 Test to his new book, Man of the House, the largely autobiographical sequel to Househusband, and reported the following:Page 69 finds our protagonist Linc Menner (the stay-at-home dad who is largely based on my life) stumbling upon his wife and their contractor in a secret meeting. But it’s not a tryst, as Linc suspects. Nope, his wife, Jo, has grown so tired of Linc’s complaining about their house being torn up for renovation that she has left her busy CEO job for an hour and taken it upon herself to sweet-talk the contractor into speeding things up.Read an excerpt from Man of the House, and learn more about the author and his work at Ad Hudler's website and blog.
It has been a horrible two months for the Menners: their home is under systemic renovation while they live there, and, as new Floridians, they are coping best as they can with the stress created by a very active hurricane season. (Again, hugely autobiographical here; we live in southwest Florida.)
Page 69:
“Why are you looking at the blueprints,” he asks.
“We’re getting ready to move into the kitchen,” Rod says. “I was showing her what comes next.”
“Are the cabinets in yet?” Linc asks.
“Yep. Got ‘em in today.”
“Cool. Are the countertops finished?”
“Yep. In fact, I don’t see why we can’t get you back into that kitchen in ten days or so.”
“Oh, man you don’t know how happy this makes me,” Linc says.
Though it’s only a half-page long, page 69 does represent my dialogue-heavy, humorous style of fiction-writing. Most of my books are very play-like, very cinematic because of this, and have attracted Hollywood producers and directors’ attention. (Nothing final signed yet, but I’m hopeful!)
I feel this snippet of dialogue on page 69 also does a good job of capturing the personality of Linc. We get the feeling he is expressive and informal, and it should come as no surprise to the reader that he was raised in southern California.
Visit the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.
--Marshal Zeringue
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