"Lady of the Eternal City"

Kate Quinn is a native of southern California. She attended Boston University, where she earned a Bachelor's and Master's degree in Classical Voice. A lifelong history buff, she first got hooked on ancient Rome while watching I, Claudius at the age of seven. She wrote her first book during her freshman year in college, retreating from a Boston winter into ancient Rome, and it was later published as Mistress of Rome. A prequel followed, titled Daughters of Rome, and then a sequel, Empress of the Seven Hills--written while her husband was deployed to the Middle East.

Quinn made the jump from ancient Rome to Renaissance Italy for her fourth and fifth novels, The Serpent and the Pearl and The Lion and the Rose, detailing the early years of the Borgia clan. She also has succumbed to the blogging bug, and keeps a blog filled with trivia, pet peeves, and interesting facts about historical fiction. She and her husband now live in Maryland with a small black dog named Caesar, and her interests include opera, action movies, cooking, and the Boston Red Sox.

Quinn applied the Page 69 Test to Lady of the Eternal City, the fourth book in the Empress of Rome series, and reported the following:

On page 69 of Lady of the Eternal City you might think you'd stumbled into a kid's book. A little girl and a little boy have just been introduced, and are sizing each other up. Not, however, as playmates:

“Married,” Annia said instead, dubious. “Us?”

He gave a shrug. “Your father's the richest man in Rome. Or one of them. And my grandfather says I'll need a rich wife.”

“Why?”

“I'm going to be Emperor.” Pedanius said it as a fact. “My grandmother was the Emperor's sister, so I'm his great-nephew.” He gave her a long, superior blink. “You should be honored. Ugly girl like you—”

Annia poked her tongue out.

So this is kind of cute; two kids in ancient Rome being matched up by ambitious adults like little chess pieces. But this scene is important, because it lays the foundation of a burning enmity that is going to power the climax a few hundred pages later. Young Pedanius's arrogance in assuming he will someday be Emperor of Rome (and his assumption that he can therefore have anything he wants, including Annia) are constant themes with his character as he grows up. And Annia's complete failure to be intimidated by Pedanius's pedigree or his rudeness will provide the spark for these two characters—not a spark of attraction, but a spark of hatred. The two kids in this little scene aren't there to be cute; they're there to realize that they are going to grow up and be mortal enemies.

Would a reader keep going, if they opened the book to this page? I hope so, considering that these kids are in a fistfight one page later before being marched back to their parents to discuss the details of their betrothal!

Learn more about the book and author at Kate Quinn's website and blog.

Coffee with a Canine: Kate Quinn and Caesar.

My Book, The Movie: Empress of the Seven Hills.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Throne of Darkness"

Douglas Nicholas is an award-winning poet, whose work has appeared in numerous poetry journals, and the author of several books, including the novel Something Red and Iron Rose, a collection of poems inspired by New York City.

He applied the Page 69 Test to his new dark fantasy novel, Throne of Darkness, and reported the following:

Page 69 of Throne of Darkness is a quiet scene amid a great deal of action, but it illustrates what Booklist said about ToD in its review: “The homogenous Northern European–style settings of fantasy tales can quickly become a bore for avid readers, which is why Nicholas is happily among the authors who draw from the medieval Western world as a whole. His new novel brings together a metropolitan collaboration of fascinating historical fantasy.”

In this scene we find seated around a table in an inn: Molly and her granddaughter Nemain, both queens in their own right back in Ireland—although the title is more akin to “clan chieftain” than to a Queen Victoria–type monarch—as well as Jack Brown, Molly’s lover and Hob, Nemain’s husband. These latter two are Englishmen. With them are Father Ugwistan, a Berber priest who is happy to point out that his name is the original form of Augustine, and that the saint was also Berber. Father Ugwistan is the assistant to Monsignor Bonacorso da Panzano, an Italian who is a clandestine papal operative, and Sinibaldo, another Italian, the monsignor’s bodyguard and a sometime assassin. They are discussing ways to thwart King John’s plot to destroy the rebellious northern barons at Runnymede, when they gather to sign Magna Carta; the plot involves a Moroccan sorcerer and his eerie tribe of blacksmiths, who have the ability to change into hyenas.

Visit Douglas Nicholas's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Pretty Wanted"

Elisa Ludwig enjoys writing about teen outlaws, even though she herself has never been one. Pretty Wanted is the final novel in the Pretty Crooked trilogy.

Ludwig applied the Page 69 Test to Pretty Wanted and reported the following:

From page 69:

“So what are you doing in St. Louis? Playing Sherlock? You should leave this to the cops.”

A woman with a plastic shopping basket stuffed with makeup and maxi pads pushed past me to look at the floss section. I moved away, turning my back to her and lowering my voice to a whisper. “No, no, no. I’m not trying to solve the case.”

“What then?”

Somehow it was getting harder to explain this when it should have been easier. “I just want to know who she was. And I can only find that out here.”

He was silent for a beat. “Either way, I wish you’d give it up. You’re putting yourself in serious danger, you know that?”

“I know. But this is something I have to do.”

“Look, all I’m saying is there are people who care about you, who don’t want to see you hurt.” His voice wavered a bit. “Don't forget about those people.”

Wow, I have to say that this book really nails it with the page 69 test! In this scene Willa is talking to Tre on the phone—he’s back home in Arizona and she’s on the run from police and FBI, looking to find out about her real mother, who was killed in St. Louis. This is the moment in the book when Willa starts to realize that her goals are not exactly clear, even to herself. Willa says she only wants to know who her mother is, but that question is becoming increasingly entangled with how and why she was murdered. At the same time she’s starting to understand that Tre may be one of the few people who truly has her best interests at heart and that their relationship may be a tad more complicated than she thought. It’s a real turning point in the book because as soon as Willa is honest with herself she can fully pursue her mission, for better or worse, and she can also figure out what she really wants from the guys in her life. In the arc of the whole series this scene really puts Willa on the cusp of actually growing up and confronting the truth.

Visit Elisa Ludwig's website.

The Page 69 Test: Pretty Sly.

My Book, The Movie: Pretty Sly.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Empire of the Senses"

Alexis Landau studied at Vassar College and received an MFA from Emerson College, and a PhD in English Literature and Creative Writing from the University of Southern California.

She applied the Page 69 Test to The Empire of the Senses, her first novel, and reported the following:

Page 69 from The Empire of the Senses touches on a few important themes of the novel, but the page itself is not representative of what the book is really about. This page, the beginning of Chapter 7, mainly describes Lev’s disillusionment with how the German army treats the native villagers on the Eastern Front. Lev observes the army’s brutality and corruption as well as the latent anti-Semitism that is expressed by a German officer who speaks to Lev in condescending terms. I suppose this page does reflect Lev’s main struggle—the tension between his German and Jewish selves. Lev is never fully at home in either identity. The page also touches on how Germany as well as Europe in general harbored the belief that Jews would always have divided loyalties (between their Jewishness and their Germaness) and therefore Jews were never fully trusted to act and feel as “real” Germans did, promoting a homogenous nationalist culture, which led to one of the main tenets of Nazism.

Visit Alexis Landau's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"When Reason Breaks"

Cindy L. Rodriguez was a newspaper reporter for the Hartford Courant and a researcher for the Boston Globe before becoming a public school teacher. She is now a reading specialist at a Connecticut middle school. She is also a founding member of Latin@s in Kid Lit and a member of the We Need Diverse Books team. She lives in Plainville, CT, with her young daughter and rescue mutt.

She applied the Page 69 Test to When Reason Breaks, her debut novel, and reported the following:

From Page 69:

(Ms. Diaz) asked Emily to read aloud. She seemed startled to be called upon but didn't protest. She read:

I dwell in Possibility -
A fairer House than Prose -
More numerous of Windows -
Superior - for Doors -

"You were supposed to go easy on us. This is making my head hurt," said Kevin.

"Good," responded Ms. Diaz. "That means you're thinking. Now, who can tell me what's going on in the first stanza?"

No hands went up. Elizabeth stared at the lines of poetry, rereading them several times. She then started to write and draw in her notebook.

"What do you notice about the poem? Let's start there."

Tommy tentatively raised his hand. Ms Diaz nodded at him.

"She uses capitalization in unusual ways."

"Good. That's a start." Ms. Diaz underlined the capitalized words.

"Should we be underlining these?" asked Kevin.

"Yes," she said. "Now, what does the capitalization do for these words?"

"Gives them importance," said Tommy.

Abby smiled admiringly at Tommy. Elizabeth noticed when she peeked from behind her hair-curtain.

Is page 69 representative of the rest of the book?
In some ways...This is a school-based story, so there are several important scenes that happen in Ms. Diaz's classroom. Also, Emily Dickinson's life and poetry heavily influence the story, so it's fitting that they are addressing one of her poems on page 69. Through the analysis of a few of Dickinson's poems, the main characters--Emily Delgado and Elizabeth Davis--discover that they have more in common with Dickinson and with each other than they first thought. Interestingly, many of the characters are named on this one page: Emily, Elizabeth, Ms. Diaz, Tommy, Kevin, and Abby, so the reader would get an immediate glimpse of the major players by previewing this page.

Would a reader skimming that page be inclined to read on?
I hope so! A reader skimming this page would be inclined to read on if he or she is interested in a story that includes diverse characters, a positive and important teacher-student relationship, and teen girls who are struggling with depression and whose personal problems are laid bare as they grow more familiar with themselves, each other, and the life and work of Emily Dickinson. I think a reader would get a sense of this when skimming page 69 and would continue reading if this kind of contemporary young adult story appeals to them.

Visit Cindy L. Rodriguez's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Dreamfire"

Kit Alloway writes primarily for young adults, having always had an affection for teenagers. In addition to writing, she plays various musical instruments, decorates cakes, mixes essential oils, and studies East European languages. She lives in Louisville, KY with her family and four very tiny dogs.

Alloway applied the Page 69 Test to Dreamfire, her debut novel, and reported the following:

Page 69 drops us into the middle of Josh explaining some of the complexities of the Dream to Will. In that way, it is pretty representative of the book—the Dream is at the center of all the action. But it also hints at the conflict between Josh and Will when she tentatively asks whether he believes in souls. Souls become a big part of this story, as does Josh’s anxiety about opening up to Will. The next page, though, gives us a lot of insight into Will’s thought process.

Visit Kit Alloway's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Fireproof Home for the Bride"

Born in Minnesota and reared in North Dakota, Amy Scheibe currently lives in Manhattan with her husband, Brian Flynn, and their two children.

She applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, A Fireproof Home for the Bride, and reported the following:

Page 69 is the first page of Chapter Five: To Hold a Thing Unknown. Two very important things happen on this page: First, Emmy Nelson puts on men’s clothing in order to prove herself capable of being a farm wife. She is awoken in the middle of the night by the slamming door of a pick up truck and is already wearing a flannel shirt and overalls, as she is expecting this to happen. She pulls on her grandfather’s cardigan and then her father’s barn coat: ready to assist with the birth of a new calf on a cold winter’s night. But before she can even leave the house, her fiancé is standing at the door, asking her to make coffee and call her father. Gender roles are fanned and extinguished in this way throughout the novel, which is set in the pocket of time between Rosie the Riveter and Gloria Steinem. Second: Emmy is dreaming of a new love even as she is determined to prove herself worthy of the one assigned to her. The hope of knowing a greater world outside of her family’s expectations is already taking shape inside of her, and will eventually propel her in surprising ways.

Visit Amy Scheibe's website and Twitter perch.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Duplicity"

As a freshman at the University of Colorado, N. K. Traver decided to pursue Information Technology because classmates said "no one could make a living" with an English degree. It wasn't too many years later Traver realized it didn't matter what the job paid--nothing would ever be as fulfilling as writing. Programmer by day, writer by night, it was only a matter of time before the two overlapped.

Traver applied the Page 69 Test to Duplicity, her first novel, and reported the following:

From Page 69:

I jerk another drawer out, one that used to hold my old Goth things from my days dating Ginger: belts with poison symbol buckles, spikey collars, chains, armbands, and my small but loud collection of weird ties. Now expensive watches and cufflinks fill the space, tidy as the other drawers.

Not mine not mine not mine—

“One,” Mom counts, from the other side of the door.

“One sec, geez.”

I toss the drawer away and throw my shoulder into the dresser. This time it yields, jogging reluctantly along the carpet and back into place.

“Two.”

I pull the door open, out of breath. “Mom, I’m not twelve anymore. Quit with the counting thing.”

“Could have fooled me,” she says. She strides past me and surveys the drawers, starts to ask about them, then shrieks.

“You broke your new mirror? That was two hundred dollars! What is wrong with you?”

“Mom, I didn’t—”

“I can’t believe this! I try to do something nice, I thought you must be upset about something since you broke your last mirror and that pretty girl hasn’t been over yet this week—”

“But—”

“So I bought you a new one. Per usual, Brandon, my hard work is repaid with your knack for destroying everything.”

Page 69 is representative both of the main struggle Brandon’s dealing with—that his mirror reflection is really screwing up his life—and the conflict he faces at home. In the way his mother keeps cutting him off, and in that last line especially, I think this sample does a good job showing that the book isn’t just about mirror shenanigans.

Visit N. K. Traver's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Soil"

Jamie Kornegay lives in the Mississippi Delta, where he moved in 2006 to establish an independent bookstore, TurnRow Book Co. Before that he was a bookseller, events coordinator, and radio show producer at the famous Square Books in Oxford, Mississippi. He studied creative fiction under Barry Hannah at the University of Mississippi.

Kornegay applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, Soil, and reported the following:

It’s the middle of the night, and the main character, a would-be farmer named Jay Mize, is alone in a pasture. He has just desecrated a body that he found in his field, covered by water from a recent flood. He is contemplative, having finished this awful work. Here is page 69 in full:

The horrible exertion of his chore had taken its toll on his body, and he could barely will himself to move. He just sat there in his lawn chair with the crude metamorphosis all around him, holding a murderer’s remorse. If he could last until morning, he knew that, as with any successful experiment, the moral ambiguities of night would give way to the scientific certainty of day.

If it seems insane to you that Jay has opted to dispose of the corpse rather than call the authorities, it is because he made the rash decision to move the body out of his field and place it in a shed in his backyard. Having gone that far, there was no turning back. “But it didn’t matter that he’d done nothing morally wrong by moving the body from the field. No one would understand why he had done it, and that would be as good as wrong.”

He is distrustful of society and doesn’t believe he will get a fair shake with the law. Circumstances leading to his discovery suggest this, along with his family history, his status as an outsider, his understanding of justice. His logic is still dubious, but he is a man of logic nonetheless. He values science and reason, neither of which are terribly useful here in the Mississippi back country.

Jay, a former soil scientist, turns on his scientific brain to arrive at the solution to his problem: how to most efficiently dispose of this organic matter, breaking it down to its finest elements and releasing them back into the world so that no traces of evidence will come back on him. His rendering method, which I devised after searching for some unique way to get rid of a body, is a scientific process that requires some gruesome preparation, and we have caught him as he has finished this and started the experiment.

But Jay is still a compassionate man – a father and husband, though failing at both – and is disgusted by what he has done. Frequently, he must force himself back into this dispassionate, scientific mindset to continue his experiment. The passage represents what I find most interesting about Jay – that he operates with one foot on solid ground and the other sliding into madness. His madness is not moving away from self-control but toward a cold, rigorous, dehumanizing logic. He is sharpening his mind to a point so fine that it could easily break off.

Jay’s science is sound, which may allow him to get away with his cover-up, but will he be able to keep a calm head and avoid suspicion when he is thrust into situations with the novel’s other characters? Will his morality stand, or will desperation drive him to greater crimes?

Follow Jamie Kornegay on Twitter.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Golden State"

Stephanie Kegan is the author of Golden State, recently named by People Magazine as one of “The Best New Books” and Entertainment Weekly as one of “The Top 10 Things We Love This Week.”

She applied the Page 69 Test to Golden State and reported the following:

Golden State tells the story of Natalie Askedahl an everyday wife and mother, who discovers her adored older brother may be a terrorist wanted by the FBI for a string of lethal bombings. When her brother is arrested, she is thrust into overnight notoriety. With reporters camped on her doorstep, she is forced to make decisions that pit her loyalty to her brother against her need to protect her own family. As her life splits permanently into before and after, Natalie begins to understand that some of the most dangerous things in the world are the stories we tell ourselves.

From page 69:

(My plate) went flying. I saw the wine shoot from my glass. Someone asked if I was all right. I got up carefully, afraid that I wasn’t, then saw the dark stains on the overstuffed white chair, the splattered food. Guests were already springing from their seats to perform triage.

I knelt to pick up my plate, and tried to wipe the seafood curry off the Persian rug with my hand. When I stood, I saw Julia staring at me from a corner of the room. I opened my mouth to say something to her, I wasn’t sure what, but she bolted, a hand over her face.

Page 69, while largely unrepresentative of the rest of the book, is still is a part of the whole. On this page Natalie knows the FBI is secretly investigating her brother, and she is trying to carry on her normal life under the weight of that burden. She is with her husband and two daughters, aged eight and fifteen, at a party at the home of her wealthy in-laws. Natalie is carrying a plate of food from the dining room to the den, a step down. She doesn’t know how she missed the step. She is, of course, mortified when she falls into the room, the contents of her plate landing all over the elegant furniture. Worse, her fifteen year old daughter Julia is a witness to her stumble. The moment is both mundane and fraught. Two pages later, Natalie will witness her brother being arrested on national television. Her former life shattered, she will be confronted with a horrific choice that will propel her into a nightmare of confusion, lies and betrayals.

Visit Stephanie Kegan's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Werewolf Cop"

Award winning author, screenwriter and media commentator Andrew Klavan is the author of such internationally bestselling novels as True Crime, filmed by Clint Eastwood, and Don’t Say A Word, filmed starring Michael Douglas. Klavan has been nominated for the Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar Award five times and has won twice.

Klavan applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, Werewolf Cop, and reported the following:

The problem in answering the page 69 test when it comes to Werewolf Cop is that, by a strange twist of providence, page 69 is the turning point of the entire novel — and I don’t want to give it away. I’m not making that up. Page 69 is the page on which the story takes a sudden turn and reveals its true nature. For 68 pages, the novel is one sort of thing. Then, on page 69, in a single very sudden, very violent, very frightening moment, it becomes something else entirely and everything that happens afterward follows from that one paragraph on that one page. In a way, many of the novels themes coalesce in that narrative moment: the curse of history, the limitations of realism, the sacrifice we have to make to fight for the good and the way that fight sometimes turns us into the very evil we oppose. All of that is in one paragraph on page 69 — so help me — so I’m just going to have to let you read it yourself.

Visit Andrew Klavan's website.

Writers Read: Andrew Klavan.

My Book, The Movie: Werewolf Cop.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Wicked Thing"

Rhiannon Thomas is an English Lit grad from Princeton University. She currently lives in York, England, in the shadow of a 13th century Gothic cathedral. When she isn’t lost in YA fantasy, she writes about feminism and the media on her blog, Feminist Fiction.

Thomas applied the Page 69 Test to A Wicked Thing, her debut novel, and reported the following:

On page 69 of A Wicked Thing, Aurora has snuck out of the castle and is meeting a boy called Tristan for the first time.

I wasn't expecting this page to be that representative of the book, but the first paragraph is actually perfect.

Here were people, treating her like she was normal, like she had no fate and no duty and no trauma around her. Someone to talk to, not protect or manipulate. It was, she thought, a first in her life. She wanted to dwell in it longer, in this freedom, where she could breathe and talk and listen and not hide everything behind expectations.

It really captures Aurora's central struggle in the book. Everyone around her has already decided who she is and what she must do, and she feels unable to push against that. She wants "freedom," but she doesn't really know what that means or what it will entail for her.

Visit Rhiannon Thomas's website.

--Marshal Zeringue