"The Witching Hour"

Catriona McPherson was born in Scotland and lived there until 2010, then immigrated to California where she lives on Patwin ancestral land. A former academic linguist, she now writes full-time. Her multi-award-winning and national best-selling work includes: the Dandy Gilver historical detective stories, the Last Ditch mysteries, set in California, and a strand of contemporary standalone novels including Edgar-finalist The Day She Died and Mary Higgins Clark finalist Strangers at the Gate. She is a member of Mystery Writers of America, The Crimewriters’ Association, The Society of Authors and Sisters in Crime, of which she is a former national president.

McPherson applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, The Witching Hour, and reported the following::

From page 69:

to be getting back. I’ve done him up the best I can, the poor soul. It was the least I could offer him.’

‘The least . . . ?’

‘A winding sheet and a posy of herbs,’ she said. ‘I’m not an undertaker. It’s a black day for Dirleton this. And we didn’t need another one. Well, I don’t need to tell you.’

She bobbed a polite curtsy then and left me. As her footsteps faded on the stairs, ringing out like knocks on a door from her wooden pattens, I heard a latch and turned to see Alec’s face peering out. ‘What the dickens?’ he said. ‘I didn’t see whoever that was, Dandy, but I heard her. There is something very odd going on around here. What on earth do you suppose these fabled writers are coming to write?’

‘I haven’t the faintest clue,’ I said. ‘But that’s the second time someone’s spoken of “her”.’

‘Well we must find her, wouldn’t you say?’

‘How?’ I demanded. It came out like a howl, as it so easily does if one’s tone of voice is not quite under one’s command.

‘The landlord’s back,’ Alec said. ‘He just brought a coffin into the yard on a little cart. I saw him from my window.’

‘Let’s ask him who “she” is then,’ I said. ‘Better than asking Miss Clarkson.’

‘Why’s that?’ said Alec.

It was not until I opened my mouth to answer him that I realised I did not know. Not for the first time since arriving in Dirleton, I shivered. I decided not to look around for open windows or doors ajar. I decided to believe there was a draught and not dislodge that belief by checking.

Page 69 is spookily efficient at indicating the tone and content of The Witching Hour, actually.

There's enough historical detail to let a prospective reader know this isn't present-day. There's a corpse being laid out in a winding sheet with a posy of herbs (which couldn't have done much, in my opinion) and Dandy and Alec, my detectives, are skulking about overhearing mystifying references to persons unknown, which tells you this is in the crime genre. There's mention of "her" - and not the first - which is gratifying for a book with the word "witch" right there in the title. And there's Dandy's subconscious knowing more than the rest of her. She's clocked Miss Clarkson as problematic, and blurts it out, with no idea why. Finally, there's a hint of the book's tone: a bit of creep and Dandy's attempt at briskness in the face of it. I think if someone found page 69 tedious, they'd be well-advised to swerve the rest of the story. But if someone felt intrigued, they wouldn't be sorry for committing.

Visit Catriona McPherson's website.

The Page 69 Test: Go to My Grave.

My Book, The Movie: The Turning Tide.

The Page 69 Test: The Turning Tide.

My Book, The Movie: A Gingerbread House.

The Page 69 Test: Hop Scot.

The Page 69 Test: Deep Beneath Us.

Q&A with Catriona McPherson.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Divorce Towers"

Ellen Meister is a novelist, book coach, screenwriter, and creative writing instructor who started her career writing advertising copy. Her novels include Take My Husband; The Rooftop Party; Love Sold Separately; Dorothy Parker Drank Here; Farewell, Dorothy Parker; The Other Life; and more. Meister’s essays have appeared in publications such as the New York Times, Newsday, the Wall Street Journal blog, the Huffington Post, the Daily Beast, Long Island Woman, Writer’s Digest, and Publishers Weekly. Career highlights include appearing on NPR, being selected for the prestigious Indie Next List by the American Booksellers Association, having her work translated into foreign languages, and receiving a TV series option from HBO.

Meister lives in New York and publicly speaks about her books, fiction writing, and America’s most celebrated literary wit, Dorothy Parker.

She applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, Divorce Towers, and reported the following:

Thank you for inviting me to put Divorce Towers to the Page 69 Test. I think it passes!

Three of the novel’s central themes are captured on this page. It opens with my main character, Addison Torres, training for her new job as concierge at a luxury Beverly Hills condo nicknamed Divorce Towers. A male resident approaches to ask Addison and her boss, Frankie, to send a birthday gift to his eight-year-old daughter and put his name on the card. He has no idea what the child might like—only that he wants it to cost about $500. After Addison presses him with questions, they decide to send the child an expensive basket of goodies that will encourage her artistic abilities.

Addison didn’t know how they would find art supplies for an eight-year-old that came anywhere close to $500, but with Frankie’s guidance she called a Beverly Hills toy store and asked them to put together a package and have it delivered that afternoon. Remembering the hours she’d spent at the kitchen table with a box of crayons and a coloring book, Addison imagined an eighteen-wheeler backing up to the little girl’s house to dump an Everest of Crayolas.

Here, in addition to highlighting the entitlement of the wealthy residents Addison encounters throughout the book, the narrative depicts her as a fish-out-of-water, which is central to Addison’s story.

Addison’s matchmaking background is also central to her story. It’s what she did in New York before her life fell apart. Now she wants to use those skills to find an appropriate match for her dear Uncle Arnie, who’s pining for his wretched ex-wife. Addison’s determination to find a more suitable love match for her uncle is the narrative engine that drives the whole book. This plot point makes an appearance on the bottom of the page, when a woman approaches the concierge desk to ask for plastic surgeon recommendations.

Addison didn’t think the lovely blond looked like she needed to have any work done, but kept that to herself. She did, however, want to stall her for a quick conversation to assess her suitableness for Arnie.

“Good luck with it,” Addison said. “I’m sure you’ll look spectacular for whatever event you’re getting ready for.”

“The only event I’m looking forward to is my divorce.”

“In that case,” Addison said, “I hope he eats his heart out.”

“Maybe if I show up with some stud on my arm,” the woman said with a bitter laugh.

“What kind of stud are you looking for?” Addison asked, hoping she wasn’t pushing it too far.

“Why? You know someone?”

I hope readers of this blog agree that this passes the test… and maybe even gets an A!

Visit Ellen Meister's website.

The Page 69 Test: Dorothy Parker Drank Here.

The Page 69 Test: Love Sold Separately.

The Page 69 Test: Take My Husband.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Them Without Pain"

Chris Nickson is the author of eleven Tom Harper mysteries, eight highly acclaimed novels in the Richard Nottingham series, and seven Simon Westow mysteries. He is also a well-known music journalist. He lives in his beloved Leeds.

Nickson applied the Page 69 Test to the newest Simon Westow mystery, Them Without Pain, an reported the following:

Page 69 of Them Without Pain doesn’t offer the reader any insight into the main plot of the book. However, it does provide the first crucial insight into the subplot, about a strange, dangerous newcomer who’s latched on to a beggar that Jane, one of the main characters, likes. The beggar is an old soldier, a veteran of the Napoleonic wars, a man with a wooden leg who’s sometimes given her information she can use as an assistant to Simon Westow, the thief-taker.

There are other street people who watch and learn things, many of them the homeless children who gather together for protection, looked after by Sally, another girl who works for Westow. Jane, who grew up on the streets, wants to discover what they’ve learned. But finding them can be difficult.

The homeless made their camps where they could. They chose empty buildings that would soon be demolished before factories started to rise from their ashes. But there was nobody in the spots she used to know. Jane wandered along the river. Ten minutes passed before she felt someone watching her. She drew out of sight into the entrance of a court, pulling out the knife and holding it down by her side. She was surprised: no worry, only the sense of anticipation. A small figure stood in the gloom. ‘Sally says you’re to come along with me.’ She put the weapon back in her pocket and followed. The girl skipped along, as if she was playing a game. They passed Cavalier Hill, then took a track that led towards the river. Jane smelled the smoke of a bonfire and started to pick out the silhouettes. She’d entered Sally’s kingdom, a shifting place the girl visited as often as she could. ‘They saw you right away,’ she said. ‘They haven’t used those old places in months.’ ‘I wanted them to find me.’ She turned her head towards the group gathered by the fire; even on a warm night, the blaze felt like comfort and safety. Boys, girls, men, women, from four years old to twenty. Some sleeping, others talking softly. Nothing had really changed from the years she’d lived this way, Jane thought; it simply felt like another age now. Maybe it would stay this way until the end of time. She was aware that many of them were observing her. ‘Have they come up with anything on the man with Dodson?’ ‘His name’s John,’ Sally told her. ‘None of them have heard him called more than that. No surname. He arrived in Leeds a few days ago. They’re scared of him.’

It's a page of background, of information, of the atmosphere of Leeds in 1825, and what life was like for these feral kids. The sense of place can be as important as the events, helping to transport the reader into the book; certainly for me it’s always been vital. An idea that life is dangerous, and often brief for the poor and the powerless. This is a page that focuses on the utterly powerless.

While it does nothing to further the book’s main story, page 69 does offer the first step in unmasking a very deadly character; that makes it important.

Visit Chris Nickson's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Constant Lovers.

The Page 69 Test: The Constant Lovers.

The Page 69 Test: The Iron Water.

The Page 69 Test: The Hanging Psalm.

Q&A with Chris Nickson.

The Page 69 Test: The Molten City.

My Book, The Movie: Molten City.

Writers Read: Chris Nickson (August 2021).

The Page 69 Test: Brass Lives.

The Page 69 Test: The Blood Covenant.

The Page 69 Test: The Dead Will Rise.

Writers Read: Chris Nickson (March 2023).

The Page 69 Test: Rusted Souls.

Writers Read: Chris Nickson (September 2023).

The Page 69 Test: The Scream of Sins.

Writers Read: Chris Nickson (March 2024).

--Marshal Zeringue

"Falling Wisteria"

Laila Ibrahim is the bestselling author of After the Rain, Scarlet Carnation, Golden Poppies, Paper Wife, Mustard Seed, and Yellow Crocus. Before becoming a novelist, she worked as a preschool director, a birth doula, and a religious educator. Drawing from her experience in these positions, along with her education in developmental psychology and attachment theory, she finds rich inspiration for her novels. She’s a devout Unitarian Universalist, determined to do her part to add a little more love and justice to our beautiful and painful world. She lives with her wonderful wife, Rinda, and two other families in a small cohousing community in Berkeley, California. Her children and their families are her pride and joy. When she isn’t writing, she likes to cuddle with her dog Hazel, take walks with friends, study the Enneagram, do jigsaw puzzles, play games, work in the garden, travel, cook, and eat all kinds of delicious food.

Ibrahim applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, Falling Wisteria, and reported the following:

This is the totality of page 69 of Falling Wisteria:

regretted showing her the Fujiokas were not next door. Now when she escaped, Hazel searched further and further away, hoping to find her beloved family. Kay Lynn understood. She also ached for the warmth and laughter of the Fujiokas' home, and for the friend she so dearly missed.

This incomplete passage is a great representation of the novel. It starts in the middle; there is a lot that came before that you have to fill in for yourself. It also speaks to Kay Lynn's lack of confidence in her own actions--no matter what she does things are wrong. And it shows that she is as emotionally confused as the beings she must care for--in this case her neighbor's beloved dog that they had to leave behind when they were sent to an internment camp during World War 2.

Visit Laila Ibrahim's website.

Q&A with Laila Ibrahim.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Berlin Apartment"

Bryn Turnbull is an internationally bestselling author of historical fiction. Equipped with a Master of Letters in Creative Writing from the University of St. Andrews, a Master of Professional Communication from Toronto Metropolitan University and a Bachelor's degree in English Literature from McGill University, Turnbull focuses on finding stories of women lost within the cracks of the historical record.

Her debut novel, The Woman Before Wallis, was named one of the top ten bestselling works of Canadian fiction for 2020 and became an international bestseller. Her second, The Last Grand Duchess, came out in February 2022 and spent eight weeks on the Globe & Mail and Toronto Star bestseller lists. It was followed by The Paris Deception, which came out in May 2023.

Turnbull applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, The Berlin Apartment, and reported the following:

Given my familiarity with The Berlin Apartment (slightly more than glancing), I felt that I wasn't the best equipped to undergo the Page 69 Test - rather, I enlisted the services of a friend who agreed to act as guinea pig on my behalf.

But first, a quick summary of the book. The Berlin Apartment opens on a sunny summer's day in 1961, where we meet Uli, a student in his final year at the Free University in West Berlin, showing his fiancée Lise the apartment he bought for them, close to the open border that divides West Berlin from East. When the Berlin Wall goes up, Lise finds herself on the "wrong side", so to speak: though technically she's East German, she's built her life in the expectation of one day coming west but, as for so many, the erection of the Wall stops her future in its tracks. What follows is a story of love, loss, betrayal and redemption, as Uli embarks upon building a tunnel to rescue Lise from East Berlin and Lise strives to conceal her plans to flee from the watchful eyes of the East German secret police.

Back to my guinea pig. What he got out of the page was, in fact, a pretty accurate sense of what the novel entails. In the scene in question, Lise, our East German protagonist, is applying for a job in East Berlin - a job which she doesn't have any real interest in having, given that the life she wants to live, with the father of her unborn child, exists on the other side of the Berlin Wall. The scene alludes to the invisible but all-too-real control wielded by the East German state over its people; Lise worries about the impact that her actions, whether in staying in East Germany or going, will have on her East German family. The word that stood out most to my guinea pig friend was at the very bottom of the page: surrender. Surrender - or the perception of surrender - to the State was part of survival in East Germany, and it's this tightrope that Lise strives to walk as she accepts the job, knowing all the while that her real future is inching ever closer, beneath her feet, as Uli digs.

Visit Bryn Turnbull's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Paris Deception.

The Page 69 Test: The Paris Deception.

Q&A with Bryn Turnbull.

My Book, The Movie: The Berlin Apartment.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Brothers Kenney"

Adam Mitzner is the acclaimed Amazon Charts bestselling author of Dead Certain, Never Goodbye, and The Best Friend in the Broden Legal series as well as the stand-alone thrillers A Matter of Will, A Conflict of Interest, A Case of Redemption, Losing Faith, The Girl from Home, The Perfect Marriage, and Love Betrayal Murder. A practicing attorney in a Manhattan law firm, he and his family live in New York City.

Mitzner applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, The Brothers Kenney, and reported the following:

Page 69 of The Brothers Kenney is ironically the first page I wrote. When I initially considered writing about a former track star brought low, the idea came to me in the form of envisioning a race.

Sean Kenney, the protagonist of The Brothers Kenney, was once a world-class 1,500-meter man. Page 69 finds him running in the NCAA championships. More specifically, he’s entering the bell lap, the point in a race when a runner must disregard the burning in his lungs and the pain in his legs and the will to win takes over.

Another important part of my pre-writing conception of the book was the mantra of Sean’s coach. Inspired by Coach Taylor in Friday Night Lights (“Clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose”) Sean refers to it as Coach Pal’s prayer: Leg’s fast; mind faster; heart unstoppable.

There are several races in the book, told as flashbacks, which provide the framework for the story. Each showcases what Sean Kenney was once capable of and begs the question whether, even though his running days are long past, he can again find that best part of himself and thereby obtain redemption for his past failures.

In that way, page 69 is a snapshot of what the book is about – showing Sean at the height of his powers and raising the specter of whether he can rise to the challenges he now confronts as he did those back in his glory days.

Visit Adam Mitzner's website.

The Page 69 Test: A Conflict of Interest.

My Book, The Movie: A Conflict of Interest.

The Page 69 Test: A Case of Redemption.

My Book, The Movie: A Case of Redemption.

The Page 69 Test: Losing Faith.

My Book, The Movie: Losing Faith.

The Page 69 Test: A Matter of Will.

My Book, the Movie: A Matter of Will.

My Book, The Movie: The Perfect Marriage.

The Page 69 Test: The Perfect Marriage.

Q&A with Adam Mitzner.

Writers Read: Adam Mitzner (May 2023).

My Book, The Movie: Love Betrayal Murder.

The Page 69 Test: Love Betrayal Murder.

My Book, The Movie: The Brothers Kenney.

Writers Read: Adam Mitzner.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Havoc"

Deborah J Ledford is the award-winning author of the Eva “Lightning Dance” Duran suspense thriller series, including Redemption and Havoc, set in Taos, New Mexico. Part Eastern Band Cherokee, she is an Agatha Award winner, The Hillerman Sky Award Finalist, and two- time Anthony Award Finalist for Best Audiobooks Crescendo and Causing Chaos from her Smoky Mountain Inquest Series set in the great Smoky Mountains of North Carolina. Ledford lives in Phoenix, Arizona with her husband and awesome Ausky.

She applied the Page 69 Test to her newest release, Havoc, and reported the following:

From page 69:

It was a long drive back to the Windy City so Optum had plenty of time to ponder the next elements with his clueless partner, far more suited to play teacher than entrepreneur home builder. He would have Salas establish a formal corporation next month so that all financials would appear legit. A lot of his boss’s money would be run through what would incrementally become a large-scale venture. Tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands—hell, why not millions—could be laundered.

The possibility bloomed and his heart thudded a quick beat, which grew even more rapid when he approached the street that led to the bank he’d hit earlier that morning. He craned his neck to get a better look. Yellow police tape remained strung across the road and a police cruiser, parked sideways, denied entry.

He thought about the night before when, always the cautious criminal, he had pulled on nitrile gloves, scrubbed a toothbrush dipped in bleach over the entire 3D printed handgun and ammunition to be sure any possible fingerprints or DNA residue would not be traced to him or Salas. Then he had loaded the rounds into the magazine and assembled the gun as Salas instructed. Maybe he hadn’t paid good enough attention to putting the thing back together but it turned out to be a useless hunk of plastic.

He knew that timing was crucial when it came to pulling off a perfect crime, essential to stick to every step and movement he rehearsed in his mind for multiple hours, sometimes days, before he initiated his fully formed plan. One second off, a single deviation from the intent, and you’re fucked. The fake gun could have cost him way more than time. He smiled. Because that was the fun of it. The rush. The adrenaline pump. The not knowing if he would survive the transgressions.

Although the main location of Taos, New Mexico, nor any of the Native American characters at the heart of Havoc are featured, the Page 69 Test is valid for Havoc, primarily because the page features illicit 3D guns, which becomes the inciting incident introduced in Chapter 1. This portion shows the antagonist at the height of his pre-planning stage to make 3D gun production profitable for his crime syndicate boss—and that anyone who stands in his way is expendable.

Visit Deborah J Ledford's website.

Q&A with Deborah J Ledford.

The Page 69 Test: Redemption.

My Book, The Movie: Redemption.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Cold, Cold World"

Elena Taylor spent several years working in theater as a playwright, director, designer, and educator before turning her storytelling skills to fiction. Her first series, the Eddie Shoes Mysteries, written under the name Elena Hartwell, introduced a quirky mother/daughter crime fighting duo.

With the Sheriff Bet Rivers Mysteries, Taylor returns to her dramatic roots and brings readers much more serious and atmospheric novels. Located in her beloved Washington State, Taylor uses her connection to the environment to produce tense and suspenseful investigations for a lone sheriff in an isolated community.

Taylor is also a senior editor with Allegory Editing, a developmental editing house, where she works one-on-one with writers to shape and polish manuscripts, short stories, and plays.

Her favorite place to be is at Paradise, the property she and her hubby own south of Spokane, Washington. They live with their horses, dogs, and cats. Taylor holds a B.A. from the University of San Diego, a M.Ed. from the University of Washington, Tacoma, and a Ph.D. from the University of Georgia.

She applied the Page 69 Test to her new Sheriff Bet Rivers mystery, A Cold Cold World, and reported the following:

A snowstorm rages in the tiny, mountain town of Collier, Washington, at the same time that Sheriff Bet Rivers questions a teenaged girl about the movements of her friend the previous day. The friend is a boy who died in a snowmobile crash high on a ridge. The teenager is angry and a little snarky, which Bet fully understands, as Aimee has been left behind at home by her parents and her closest friend while the power is out and the storm rages all around her. Bet needs the information the girl has but is also sensitive to the teen’s situation. Bet can’t tell Aimee that her friend is dead, which makes it harder to ask her questions because she can’t share any information in return. She’s thoughtful, but professional, and under a lot of stress to determine what caused the accident.

Page 69 provides an excellent idea of one aspect of the book, which is that of Bet’s processes as a sheriff investigating a crime. There is a summation of recent events in her mind as she questions the girl, and readers can also see how Bet thinks about people. What it doesn’t do is show the action that takes place in much of the book. A Cold, Cold World is a mystery, not a thriller, but it does have a lot of physical, dangerous action. So, I would say this page does a great job of showing how thoughtful and methodical Bet can be when investigating a homicide, but doesn’t show the action sequences, such as pursuing suspects in the storm.

A Cold, Cold World is the second in the Sheriff Bet Rivers series. Bet is a lot more confident in her role as sheriff now that she was voted in and isn’t just there as an interim. However, Bet continues to work on her own identity in the role. She’s realizing that she’s never going to be the sheriff the way her father was (and his father before him), but that doesn’t make her better or worse, just different. A good example of that is on page 69. The teen shows embarrassment at admitting she’s afraid to be alone in the storm. Bet says, “I don’t like to be left alone in the dark either. That’s why I have a big dog.” This line illustrates how Bet is in the world. She’s okay admitting to something that could be perceived as a weakness, especially if it helps her connect to another person. I like that about Bet. Plus. I love the dog! Schweitzer is an Anatolian shepherd and definitely a fan favorite.

Visit Elena Taylor's website.

Q&A with Elena Taylor.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Poisonous Palate"

Writing as Lucy Burdette, clinical psychologist Roberta Isleib is the author of 24 mysteries, including the Key West food critic mystery series. Her most recent book is A Poisonous Palate, along with a cookbook based on the series (Lucy Burdette’s Kitchen.) Number 13, A Clue in the Crumbs, was a USA Today bestseller and Florida Book Award gold medal winner in popular fiction. Both A Dish to Die For and The Key Lime Crime won the bronze medal for popular fiction from the Florida Book Awards. She's a past president of Sisters in Crime, and currently president of the Friends of the Key West Library.

Burdette applied the Page 69 Test to A Poisonous Palate and reported the following:

Page 69 at the beginning of chapter 9 carries some important weight, but may not give the best idea of the whole book. Before I explain, I will show you the page:

“Almost every family has a secret they never discuss. Ours is this: We were taste testers for Pop-Tarts.”
—Laura M. Holson, “Confessions of a Pop-Tarts Taste Tester,” New York Times, October 6, 2023

I fired my empty coffee cup into the trash and walked two blocks to the Key Zest office. Once again, I felt baffled by the many moods of Catherine. How could one person be simultaneously imperious and grateful?

Palamina and Danielle had already gathered in Palamina’s office. My boss, Palamina, moved down from New York to Key West a few years ago to take charge of Key Zest, and she still struggled to adjust to the slower pace of island life. Danielle had worked at the e-zine as a receptionist almost from its inception. She was a native Key Wester—a Conch—who had embraced her engagement and upcoming marriage to a Key West police officer with the same ebullience she brought to her job and her friendships. At the moment, Palamina wore the expression of a cold-snap-stunned fish, so I suspected Danielle had been regaling her with the last-minute details of her Sunday wedding. She practically grabbed my hand to pull me in. “What do you have for us for next week?” she asked.

Why oh why couldn’t we have chosen a page highlighting some amazing cooking, or a pulse-pounding action sequence, or even some toe-curling sexy romance. (Oh wait, I don’t write that.) Instead, we find food critic Hayley Snow in transition from discussing possible sleuthing for a strong-minded woman intent on solving a cold case, to her arrival at the Key Zest office, where she works as a food critic.

I do like some of the character development on this page—Hayley’s confusion about this prickly woman who asked for help in the previous chapter, Danielle’s enthusiasm about her upcoming wedding, and their boss’s dismay at hearing too many nuptial details. But this page also highlights a big conundrum for the writer of a long running mystery series. A Poisonous Palate is number 14 in the Key West series, which means there will be a variety of consumers: loyal readers who have read every book in the series and know the characters better than I do, longtime readers who may have read the books but don’t have total recall, readers who’ve read some of the books but not all, and readers who are brand new to the series. One challenge is to summarize some of what’s happened in previous books, without plot spoilers and without tedium. The same goes for characters. I need to include enough information about recurring characters as they appear on the page so that new readers can pick up without getting lost, but without boring devoted fans. I hope I did that here on page 69!

Visit Lucy Burdette's website, Twitter perch, and Facebook page.

The Page 69 Test: An Appetite For Murder.

Writers Read: Lucy Burdette (January 2012).

The Page 69 Test: Death in Four Courses.

The Page 69 Test: A Scone of Contention.

My Book, The Movie: Unsafe Haven.

The Page 69 Test: A Dish to Die for.

--Marshal Zeringue

Katherine Blake's "The Unforgettable Loretta Darling"

Katherine Blake is a pseudonym for Karen Ball, an author who has written over twenty-five children’s books and was a Bookseller Rising Star thanks to her publishing consultancy, Speckled Pen.

She regularly appears on podcasts, including The Bestseller Experiment and SJ Bennett’s PrePublished. She lives in London and runs a biweekly newsletter filled with fun news, book reviews, and regular updates about her miniature schnauzer.

Blake applied the Page 69 Test to her latest novel, The Unforgettable Loretta Darling, and reported the following:

I’d never heard of the Page 69 Test, but the gods of typesetting had already gifted me a memorable page 69 in The Unforgettable Loretta Darling as she encountered a Golden Era Hollywood party…

From page 69:

Chapter 13

I never expected my first orgy to be quite this glamorous. It was full of actors, actresses, directors, producers, writers – all looking for distraction. And, boy, had they found it. The stars worked their butts off during the week, but on a weekend they partied hard.

Still, nothing had prepared me for this.

The smiles were painted on as thick as the Silver Stone No. 2 body paint some of the naked girls were smothered in as they paraded around in their swimsuits and feather headdresses. Clouds of blue cigar smoke billowed above our heads. Have you ever heard the rattle of a studio executive’s laughter? I tell you, it sends a chill down your spine.

I walked past a tight clutch of men in suits, one of them loudly complaining, ‘I brought the son of a bitch over from Europe, paid for his passage, and all he does is tell me that the story I paid eighty thousand for is no good.’ As one, the group turned and stared darkly at the oblivious young actor who was kissing a woman by the pool.

Primrose was still holding my hand and my grip tightened as we gazed around.

‘Keep smiling,’ she said from between clenched teeth. ‘Just keep smiling!’

Does my page 69 tell you everything that you need to know about the novel? Some. Loretta still has a lot to learn – not just about Hollywood but about herself. Still, it’s clear that she’s up to the task. How did I achieve that in so few words? Let’s take a look.

Loretta has a voice that spills out from chapter one. By page 69, we can be confident that she has the backbone of a whale, to take on whatever life throws at her. She’s not running anywhere, and certainly not from the best adventure that’s ever hit her. Or the best adventure she’s ever found, by bribing her way to America.

She’s arrived with ambitions to be a make-up artist and her future skills are already seeded in this extract as she recognises the body paints and the studio executives. She can describe the colours – the blue cigar smoke – and eavesdrop on gossip. In 200 short words, we understand who Loretta is, and what she faces. We are also certain that she’s going to survive and it won’t be by wearing Silver Stone No. 2 body paint…

Visit Katherine Blake's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Queen City Detective Agency"

Snowden Wright is the author of American Pop and Play Pretty Blues. He has written for The Atlantic, Salon, Esquire, and the New York Daily News, among other publications. A former Marguerite and Lamar Smith Fellow at the Carson McCullers Center, Wright lives in Yazoo County, Mississippi.

He applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, The Queen City Detective Agency, and reported the following:

From page 69:

“They were worried about the black-and-white police cruiser that had been parked across the street for hours.”

The Page 69 Test works well for my book.

Page 69 concludes Chapter Eight of The Queen City Detective Agency. The sentence above is the only complete one on the page.

Set in 1980s Mississippi, Queen City follows the private detective Clementine Baldwin, a former cop, as she investigates a high-profile murder. Chapter Eight ends with Clem waking up to realize that the DA’s office assigned a squad car to watch her apartment—not out of suspicion but concern for her safety. They’re afraid the Dixie Mafia will seek retaliation against the PI handling the case.

The last line of the chapter invokes the fraught relationship many people have with the police. The “they” who are worried about the police cruiser across the street are Clem’s neighbors, and as we learn in the next chapter, her neighbors, like Clem herself, are Black.

Trayvon Martin, Rekia Boyd, Eric Garner...

Although Queen City takes places thirty years before the Black Lives Matter movement, I did my best to conjure it, a sort of ghost from the future. Writers of historical fiction often succumb to anachronistic virtue—making their historical protagonists improbably, if not impossibly progress-minded and pure-hearted—but the issues rooted in Black Lives Matter are, unfortunately, perennial. I couldn’t cite the moment by name, of course, but I could address racially motivated violence an discrimination committed by those who are supposed to protect and serve.

The line on page 69 is one of many like it in Queen City. A primary crux of the novel concerns how Clem Baldwin’s allegiances, as a woman of color and as a former badge, are pulled in two directions. She has faith in the law but also knows how often it’s broken by the very people meant to uphold it.

Visit Snowden Wright's website.

The Page 69 Test: American Pop.

My Book, The Movie: The Queen City Detective Agency.

--Marshal Zeringue

"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.

The Page 69 Test: The Hollow Girl.

The Page 69 Test: Where It Hurts.

The Page 69 Test: What You Break.

Writers Read: Reed Farrel Coleman (March 2017).

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