The Page 69 Test: "The Incident of the Book in the Nighttime"

Vicki Delany is one of Canada’s most prolific and varied crime writers and a national bestseller in the U.S. She has written more than forty books: clever cozies to Gothic

thrillers to gritty police procedurals, to historical fiction and novellas for adult literacy. She is currently writing four cozy mystery series: the Tea by the Sea mysteries for Kensington, the Sherlock Holmes Bookshop series for Crooked Lane Books, the Catskill Resort mysteries for Penguin Random House, and the Lighthouse Library series (as Eva Gates) for Crooked Lane.

Delany is a past president of the Crime Writers of Canada and co-founder and organizer of the Women Killing It Crime Writing Festival. Her work has been nominated for the Derringer, the Bony Blithe, the Ontario Library Association Golden Oak, and the Arthur Ellis Awards. She is the recipient of the 2019 Derrick Murdoch Award for contributions to Canadian crime writing. Delany lives in Prince Edward County, Ontario.

Delany applied the Page 69 Test to her tenth Sherlock Holmes Bookshop mystery, The Incident of the Book in the Nighttime, and reported the following:

From page 69:
“Oh, yes. Once we were inside, he exclaimed over absolutely everything.” She chuckled. “I was at the exit, checking up on the news on my phone, while he was still reading every word on every plaque and marker.”

A woman inadvertently shoved the wheel of a baby buggy against my shin. “Sorry,” she mumbled. The toddler holding on to the handles of the buggy began to cry. “Sorry,” the mother said again. She gave me a tired grimace, and I smiled in reply.

We got off at Embankment station and walked the short distance to the bookshop. The area wasn’t quite as busy as it can get in the summer, but it was still packed with tourists taking selfies, browsing the shops, wandering the narrow streets heading for Trafalgar Square and the galleries. “I’d like to have lunch at St. Martin-in-the-Fields again one day,” Jayne said. “The crypt is so cool.”

“Let’s keep that in mind,” I said. “If time permits.”

“We’ll have to go while Andy’s away. He’ll want to read every word on every gravestone, and we’ll never get out of there.”

Foot traffic was moving at its normal pace outside Trafalgar Fine Books. Police tape was stretched across the door, but that section of Villers Street was no longer blocked off. A single uniformed cop stood outside the shop, guarding the entrance, looking almost as bored as I would have if I’d gone on the men’s fishing expedition. Jayne and I stood on the other side of the street, watching. A few people glanced at the tape and the officer and tried to peer in the windows, but most paid no attention. Londoners can be a single-minded lot.

I could see some movement inside but not well enough to make out who it was or what they were doing.

“In for a penny,” I said to Jayne, “in for a pound. Let’s see what we can see.” We crossed the street.

“Good afternoon,” I said to the constable at the front door. “Is DI Patel around?”

He eyed me warily. “Who wants to know?”

“My name is Gemma Doyle, and this is my friend and colleague Jayne Wilson.”
The Incident of the Book in the Nighttime passes the Page 69 Test with flying colours.

The book takes place in England, rather than the usual setting for this series of Cape Cod, and that is clear in this section, beginning with mention of Embankment Station, Trafalgar Square, St. Martin-in-the-Fields. If that’s not enough of a clue, Londoners are named.

They may be in London, but it is clear that this is a contemporary-set novel, as the one of the characters refers to checking the news on her phone.

Obviously a crime of some sort has happened – police tape around the entrance, an officer guarding the door. Equally obviously, our main characters, Gemma and Jayne, are not police officers, as the reader can tell from their movements that they have no authority here.

The mood of a cozy mystery is set: the two women are obviously friends as they chat in a lighthearted way about a mutual friend. In addition, they are interested in whatever has happened in the bookstore, although the reader doesn’t know, from reading this page alone, what that might have been. Serious enough, at any rate, that part of the street was blocked off earlier and they are inquiring if the Detective Inspector in charge of the case is sill there.

I cheated ever so slightly here, by including the first line of page 70. This is a Sherlock Holmes Bookshop mystery, and the character of Gemma Doyle, the protagonist, is intended to be my interpretation of Sherlock Holmes as a modern young woman. Her introduction of Jayne to the uniformed police officer, as ”my friend and colleague,” is a clear reference to the Sherlock Holmes Canon, as Holmes often called Dr. Watson, his ‘friend and colleague.”

If you sneak in the first line of page 70, The Incident of the Book in the Nighttime, passes the Page 69 Test easily.