"Blind To Midnight"

Called a hard-boiled poet by NPR’s Maureen Corrigan and the noir poet laureate in the Huffington Post, Reed Farrel Coleman is the New York Times-bestselling author of thirty-one novels—including six in Robert B. Parker’s Jesse Stone series—short stories, poetry, and essays.

In addition to his acclaimed series characters, Moe Prager and Gus Murphy, he has written the stand-alone novel Gun Church and collaborated with decorated Irish crime writer Ken Bruen on the novel Tower.

Coleman is a four time Edgar Award nominee in three different categories: Best Novel, Best Paperback Original, and Best Short Story. He is a four-time recipient of the Shamus Award for Best PI Novel of the Year. He has also won the Audie, Macavity, Barry, and Anthony Awards.

With their kids moved away to far off Brooklyn, Coleman, his wife Rosanne, and their cats live in the wilds of Suffolk County on Long Island.

Coleman applied the Page 69 Test to his new Nick Ryan novel, Blind to Midnight, and reported the following:

From page 69:

[In an oil painting]
A tall, elegant-looking man of forty stood beside a younger blond-haired woman who would have been equally at home on the cover of Vogue or House Beautiful. Seated in front of them were two teenage children, a boy and a girl. The girl, older than her brother had her dad’s looks. The boy, his mother’s. Nick recognized the boy. The photo array on the Steinway grand piano confirmed it. The kid was older now. He wasn’t covered in mud, nor was he begging for his life.

This is the totality of page 69, but it is revealing, because in two crucial ways, the plot revolves around the people in the painting. Earlier, Nick and his ersatz partner, Ace, rescue the boy in the painting from being executed. The reason for the attempted execution lies at the heart of the story, though at this point in the novel, neither Nick, the rescued boy, nor the boy’s mother, the blond-haired woman, Victoria Lansdale, have any notion of what is to come. One thing is clear, the Lansdales are wealthy and someone means to do some or all of them harm. Nick is conflicted about people of power and wealth because his heart is for the little guy, but the love of his life, Shana Carlyle is from a wealthy Park Avenue family. So while Nick wants no thanks for the rescue nor any part of the Lansdales, he cannot help but be drawn into their orbit.

I don’t know about the validity of the Page 69 Test. Sometimes, sure, page 69 is meaningful, but it is just as likely not essential to the story. In Blind to Midnight this seemingly innocuous passage happens to feature important players in what is to come. I think it’s a fun concept and it can be interesting to see how my fellow authors twist themselves into pretzels to find significance in their page 69s. This time, I got lucky.

Visit Reed Farrel Coleman's website.

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The Page 69 Test: Where It Hurts.

The Page 69 Test: What You Break.

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My Book, The Movie: Sleepless City.

Q&A with Reed Farrel Coleman.

The Page 69 Test: Sleepless City.

Writers Read: Reed Farrel Coleman.

--Marshal Zeringue