"In the Woods"

Carrie Jones is the The New York Times bestseller author of the Need series, Time Stoppers series, Flying series, Girl, Hero, Tips on Having a Gay (ex) Boyfriend, and Love (and other uses for duct tape), as well as After Obsession and Summer Howl with Steven E. Wedel.

Steven E. Wedel is a high school English teacher, and lives with his wife and children in Oklahoma.

Jones applied the Page 69 Test to their new novel, In the Woods, and reported the following:

From page 69:

“He ain’t here. Just the girl.”

I don’t know if this is good news or bad news. My palms are sweating like crazy. That is such a cliché that not even I would try to put it in a poem. Damn. I swallow hard, try to calm down.

“Can you tell me what room?” I ask.

“They know you’re coming?”

“Are you their personal secretary?”

“Don’t you sass me, boy,” the man snarls.

“Sorry,” I concede, holding up my hands in a show of peace. “Can you just please tell
me what room number?”

“Let me see some ID. Anything happens up there and that girl’s daddy needs to whup you, I wanna know who to send him after.” The guy gets off the wooden stool he was perched on and shuffles toward the counter while I withhold a disgusted sigh and pull out my wallet. He copies down my name and address, then pauses. “You’re the kid who saw Bigfoot.”

“Yeah.” I snap my wallet closed. The guy reeks of tobacco and old, greasy food.

“Was it big? They say Bigfoot has a powerful bad smell. Did it smell bad?”

“I really don’t remember.” Of course, I remember everything, but I’m not going to tell him about it.

“What room?”

“Twelve,” he says, his eyes a little wider now, like they’re filled with wonder.

A minute later I’m standing outside a dull-green door with a “12” screwed to it in flat black aluminum numerals at eye level, just above a peephole. I take a deep breath to steady myself, then wish I hadn’t, as the smell of old urine and mold fills my nose.

I knock on the door.

So In the Woods switches between the two main characters’ points of view and right here you see Logan, this normally chill Oklahoma farmboy whose life has turned upside down because he may have seen Bigfoot. Because of this sighting a Maine girl and her cryptozoologist dad (mostly her father) are investigating. Love ensues. Creepiness happens. Hands sweat.

You can see part of that here via Logan’s viewpoint. So, yes! Page sixty-nine is an excellent test.

Visit Carrie Jones's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Carrie Jones & Tala.

My Book, The Movie: In the Woods.

--Marshal Zeringue