"For Your Own Good"

Samantha Downing is the author of the bestselling My Lovely Wife, nominated for Edgar, ITW, Macavity, and CWA awards. Amazon Studios and Nicole Kidman's Blossom Films have partnered to produce a feature film based on the novel.

Her second book, He Started It, was released in 2020 and became an instant international bestseller.

Downing applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, For Your Own Good, and reported the following:

Page 69 of For Your Own Good is the start of Chapter 17. Teddy Crutcher, an English teacher at Belmont Academy, is trying to get back to work after a little...chaos. The parent of one of his students turned up dead, and that's something he had to deal with. But now he's back in class, doing what he thinks he does best: Teaching.

This particular page in the book is an excellent introduction to who Teddy is. His students are reading the book The Outsiders, and he leads a discussion about the class differences in the novel. The two main groups are the Socs, the rich kids, and the Greasers, who do not have a lot of money. Teddy relates to the latter. He didn't grow up wealthy, was not privileged, and in his mind, he's the underdog. His students, on the other hand, are rich and entitled and attend a prestigious private school. Teddy isn't shy about letting his feelings known, though they are hidden within the context of the book the class is reading. As the discussion continues, Teddy leads his students to the point he wants to make: They are the Socs. He wants them to know that.

Visit Samantha Downing's website.

The Page 69 Test: My Lovely Wife.

The Page 69 Test: He Started It.

--Marshal Zeringue