"Bunyan and Henry; Or, the Beautiful Destiny"

Mark Cecil is an author, journalist and host of The Thoughtful Bro show, for which he conducts author interviews with an eclectic roster of award winning and bestselling writers. He has written for LitHub, Writer’s Digest, Cognoscenti, The Millions, Reuters, and Embark Literary Journal, among other publications. He is Head of Strategy for A Mighty Blaze and he has taught writing at Grub Street and The Writers Loft.

Cecil applied the Page 69 Test to his debut novel, Bunyan and Henry; Or, the Beautiful Destiny, and reported the following:

I’d never heard of the Page 69 Test till you brought it to my attention, but I love the idea of it—the notion that the part will contain the whole in its microcosm. In the case of my book, the test just happens to work phenomenally well.

In my novel, Bunyan and Henry; Or, The Beautiful Destiny, Paul Bunyan has not become a lumberjack yet. Instead, he is stuck in a miserable life in a mining hamlet called Lump Town. His life is prosaic, brutal and nasty. Long ago, when he was a child, he always heard stories about a magical figure called a Chilali, a mythic being who helps guide a person along his or her “Twisty Path” to the “Beautiful Destiny,” a kind of higher, more authentic kind of life. But as an adult, Bunyan has dismissed his childhood dreams and idealism, and decided that Chilalis aren’t real. He has grown too cynical to believe in such a thing as the “Beautiful Destiny.”

However, when his wife grows ill and his life has begun to fall apart, one day an actual Chilali appears to him. At first, Bunyan is afraid of the idea of following the Twisty Path of the Chilali. It seems dangerously naïve. He thinks he’s going crazy. But on page 69 of my book, he has a change of heart. He seeks out the Chilali in the woods, and on this very page, he decides to begin to follow the Twisty Path.

Suddenly, he heard a voice.

“So, you have decided to embrace your true gift?”

The voice of the Chilali came from behind and above him, cool and ironic as it had been the day before.

“The straight path has failed,” said Bunyan. “But I cannot do this alone.”

To find the Chilali, Bunyan has climbed an enormous, petrified tree. Lump Town itself is covered in ash and soot—a kind of protocapitalist hellscape. But up here in the tree, for the first time in years, Bunyan finds fresh fruit growing. This passage on page 69 not only shows the fantastical setting of the book, but also demonstrates the rewards of beginning to chase the Beautiful Destiny. Now that he has sought out the Chilali, his life has become renewed.

A smell soon struck Bunyan’s nose. A strange smell. A delectable smell.

“What is that?” Bunyan eagerly looked about, his mouth watering.

Moments later Bunyan saw, growing from a crack in the branch, something he had not seen in years: soft, fresh, green, living . . . life. It appeared to be a vine of grapes.

They were strange-looking grapes—small, withered, hard. But they were growing nonetheless, fighting for life here in the smallest of crevices.

He knelt and took one in his hand. A tiny, perfect green sphere. He placed it in his mouth and pressed his teeth down upon it. He felt a cool eruption of juice, followed by overwhelming sweetness. For years, what had he eaten? Crumbly bread, smoked and salted meats, beans out of the tin. He found another, this one misshapen like an eggplant. He ate. More juice. It was ecstasy.

In the following pages, Bunyan will leave Lump Town for good and set out on his grand adventure. But the pivot point of the story happens to occur on page 69, when he finally says yes to the Beautiful Destiny.

Visit Mark Cecil's website.

My Book, The Movie: Bunyan and Henry; Or, the Beautiful Destiny.

--Marshal Zeringue