"Side by Side"

Jenni L. Walsh has spent the past decade enticing readers as an award-winning advertising copywriter. Her passion lies in transporting readers to another world, be it in historical or contemporary settings.

Walsh applied the Page 69 Test to Side by Side, book 2 in the Bonnie series, and reported the following:

From page 69:

My heart leaps, and in that moment, all questions ’bout Clyde’s character dissolve. If he’s willing to pull up a chair in the visitors’ room, he’s willing to risk it all for me.

The gals, not many of them receiving their own guests, shout their encouragement. But when I walk into the room, I stop dead in my tracks.

“Betty Thornton,” Blanche says, standing behind a small table. “Stripes agree with you.”

My cheeks burn and I can’t seem to get my feet to move. She ain’t who I was expecting. She ain’t who I want to see me this way.

“It’s okay,” she says. “Remember how I once had intercourse,” she says plainly, then lowers her voice, “in a church? I ain’t one to judge.”

I shake off my disappointment. It only takes a few steps before my arms are ’round her. My eyes sting with tears. I hug Blanche harder.

“Enough of that,” she says. We both sit, and while Blanche’s eyes shine with excitement, like she’s stuck between right and wrong, her back is stiff, like it gives her the heebie-jeebies to actually step foot in a jail. She lowers her voice. “You okay? I’m surprised you ain’t panting with how hot it is in here.”

I nod. I am fine, physically, at least.

I was so happy when I began reading Page 69 and it was a conversation between Bonnie and Blanche, who is Bonnie’s best friend (and Clyde’s brother’s wife). While the storyline is very much about Bonnie and Clyde, it’s also about the evolution of various characters, including Blanche. She’s a large part of the novel. At the onset she’s a bearcat. Then, when she begins running with Bonnie and Clyde, something she didn’t want for herself but did so out of love for her husband, Buck, the reader begins to see her personality, choices, and decisions begin to shift. She doesn’t want a life on the lam for her and Buck. Above, in Blanche’s words and reactions, we get a glimpse into the start of her evolution, which ultimately affects her relationship with Bonnie, and later, Bonnie experiences a great amount of guilt when it comes to Blanche’s involvement in Bonnie and Clyde’s life of crime.

Visit Jenni L. Walsh's website.

The Page 69 Test: Becoming Bonnie.

My Book, The Movie: Becoming Bonnie.

--Marshal Zeringue