The Boy Who Saw, Dark Objects, and The Clearing, and has worked in British television for more than twenty years. As a writer, director, and producer he’s made several award-winning shows, one of which won a BAFTA. He lives in England with his wife and family, where he is permanently at work on his next novel.
Toyne applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, The Black Highway, and reported the following:
My new book starts with a headless, handless body washing up on the banks of the River Thames in the heart of London, and page 69 is right in the middle of the autopsy, so it’s a crucial scene that reveals key pieces of information that will propel the story forward towards an eventual solution to the mystery of who this man is.Visit Simon Toyne's website, Facebook page, Twitter perch, and Instagram page.
Having a body with no head or hands – apart from being downright bizarre – also makes it incredibly hard to identify the victim, so this scene largely revolves around speculation as to who the man is and, by extension, who might have wanted to kill him in such a violent and brutal way.
It’s a very visual scene, a hallmark of all my books and a legacy of my previous career in television, and takes place in a makeshift morgue by the river, convened in haste because the body washed up somewhere very visible and is already becoming a big news story that the police want to get ahead of. As a result, the pathologist, Dr Evelyn Prior, a fearsome glamazon who looks like a 1950’s Italian film star, is in a couture dress she wore to the opera before her evening was interrupted, ninja uniformed river police watch on like attendant courtiers, and my two series characters Dr Laughton Rees, highly respected criminologist, and DCI Tannahill Khan, Metropolitan homicide detective, confer about the clothes the dead man was wearing, looking for clues in the well-cut suit and handmade shoes, and puzzled as to why someone who is a ‘someone’ and clearly not a vagrant has not yet been reported missing.
At the end of this scene - not quite on page 69, but close – they find a clue on the body, something that at first looks like a tattoo but is in fact something written in marker pen - P. Brannigan.
Is this the headless man’s name, they wonder? Or maybe even the man who killed him leaving a bizarre calling card. No, Laughton Rees, realises, it most likely refers to a building close by to where the body was found, the Brannigan building, with the P standing for the Penthouse. Laughton knows the building and the Penthouse well, because it’s not only where she lives, but also where her teenage daughter Gracie is currently home alone…
My Book, The Movie: Sanctus.
The Page 69 Test: Sanctus.
The Page 69 Test: The Tower.
My Book, The Movie: The Tower.
My Book, The Movie: The Searcher.
Writers Read: Simon Toyne (October 2015).
The Page 69 Test: The Searcher.
The Page 69 Test: The Clearing.
My Book, The Movie: The Clearing.
Q&A with Simon Toyne.
--Marshal Zeringue
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