Tuesday, April 13, 2010

"The Alchemy of Murder"

Carol McCleary was born in Seoul, Korea and lived in Hong Kong, Japan, and the Philippines. She now lives on Cape Cod in an antique house that is haunted by ghosts.

She applied the Page 69 Test to The Alchemy of a Murder, her first novel, and reported the following:
In 1889, Nellie Bly, the world’s first investigative reporter, Jules Verne, the “inventor” of science fiction, Louis Pasteur, the great microbe hunter, and Oscar Wilde, the cafĂ© wit who shocked the Victorians with his scandalous sex life, were all in Paris – along with a dazzling world’s fair, a pandemic that would kill over a million people as it swept across Europe, and anarchists, political terrorists who cast their “votes” with bombs and assassinations.

Whew! What an incredible era – what amazing people these Victorians were! With so much history, mystery, and science in place, all the cast of characters needed was a good murder mystery to get the pot – or plot – boiling.

That came when I read Nellie’s own account about how she couldn’t get a job as a New York reporter because Joseph Pulitzer and all the other publishers felt it was “no job for a lady.” To prove that she could do the job, she got herself committed to the notorious women’s madhouse on Blackwell’s Island, convincing police, three psychiatrists and a judge she was hopelessly insane. She spent ten days in the madhouse and wrote an exposĂ© that shocked New York– and got her the job. She wrote a book about her time in the asylum, but failed to mention the murder mystery she got entangled in that sent her off to London and Paris to solve the crime of the century.

Page 69 is part of a scene with Dr. Pasteur and Brouardel, a medical doctor, who lock horns over the cause of “Black Fever,” a mysterious malady killing people. The paragraph I’ve drawn from shows not only the friction between Pasteur, who finally proved that “germs” caused many diseases, and medical doctors, who Pasteur accused of spreading germs by not washing their hands, but also the state of Victorian science and technology. It was an exciting era in which new discoveries were being made almost every day.
The fact that Pasteur had not acquiesced to the causation Brouardel opined to the city’s newspapers infuriated the director even more than his customary intolerance toward Pasteur. But it wasn’t just Brouardel who held ill will toward Pasteur – medical practitioners resented the fact that people believed Pasteur was a medical doctor. In fact, he was a chemist. They were also infuriated at Pasteur’s accusation that doctors spread infection from one patient to another by their failure to sanitize their hands and instruments.
Having Pasteur help Nellie solve the mystery that began in the madhouse was especially meaningful to me. While I should be grateful for the “pasteurization” that makes milk and other drinks safe, I am more thankful for his rabies cure because I was bitten by a rabid dog as a child.
View the video trailer for The Alchemy of Murder, and learn more about the book and author, at Carol McCleary's website.

Visit the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Monday, April 12, 2010

"Changeless"

Gail Carriger began writing in order to cope with being raised in obscurity by an expatriate Brit and an incurable curmudgeon, according to her official biography. She escaped small town life and inadvertently acquired several degrees in Higher Learning. Ms. Carriger then traveled the historic cities of Europe, subsisting entirely on biscuits secreted in her handbag. She now resides in the Colonies, surrounded by a harem of Armenian lovers, where she insists on tea imported directly from London and cats that pee into toilets. She is fond of teeny tiny hats and tropical fruit.

She applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, Changeless, and reported the following:
This page is one of the moments of conversation designed to build the mystery that drives the story. Readers get a peek at Alexia's personality and her relationship with the rest of the wolf pack. They also learn that her husband has vanished and that there is more than one problem for the intrepid Lady Maccon to handle. I do usually use dialogue for these kinds of scenes, so that is typical of both this book and my writing style. That said, I do believe that the rest of the book is a bit more action packed than page 69.
"And he did not take Tunstell with him." Professor Lyall stated the obvious in clear annoyance, pointing to the redhead who was looking ever more guilty and ever more eager to continue chewing rather than participate in the conversation.

Lady Maccon worried at that information. Why should Conall take Tunstell? "Is he in danger? Shouldn't you have gone with him, then?"

Lyall snorted. "Yes. Picture the state of his cravat without a valet to tie him in." The Beta, always the height of understated elegance, winced in imagined horror.

Alexia privately agreed with this.

"Could not take me," muttered the Tunstell in question. "Had to go in wolf form. Trains are down, what with the engineer's strike. Not that I should mind going; my play's finished its run, and I've never seen Scotland." There was a note of petulance in his tone.

Hemming, one of the resident pack members, slapped Tunstell hard on the shoulder. "Respect," he growled without looking up from his meal.

"Where, precisely, has my husband taken himself off to in Scotland?" Lady Maccon pressed for details.

"The southern part of the Highlands, as I understand it," replied the Beta.

Alexia recovered her poise. What little she had. Which admittedly wasn't generally considered much. The southern Highland area was the vicinity of Conall's previous abode. She thought she understood at last. "I take it he found out about his former pack's Alpha being killed?"

Now it was Major Channing's turn to be surprised. The blond man practically spat out his mouthful of fritter. "How did you know that?"
Read an excerpt from Changeless, and learn more about the book and author at Gail Carriger's website and blog.

My Book, The Movie: Soulless by Gail Carriger.

Visit the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Sunday, April 11, 2010

"212"

Alafair Burke's acclaimed series featuring NYPD Detective Ellie Hatcher includes Dead Connection and Angel’s Tip.

She applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, 212, and reported the following:
If I’d been sufficiently prescient to foresee my participation in the Page 69 Test, I would have figured out a way to paginate 212 differently. As it stands, Page 69 of 212 contains only five lines that end Chapter 12. To quote even that small excerpt, I have to cheat, reaching over to page 68 for the beginning of a sentence:
Ellie was about to log onto her computer when she caught sight of Max Donovan through the open slates of the blinds that covered Lieutenant Robin Tucker’s office. Tucker stood, walked to her office door, and poked her head into the squad room.

“Good timing, you two. A quick word?”

Rogan shot Ellie a look that made her wish she’d checked Max’s message in the car. “This can’t be good.”
Not much happening there, but the exchange does capture the work-a-day precinct atmosphere that serves as the backdrop for 212 as NYPD Detective Ellie Hatcher and her partner, JJ Rogan, investigate the murder of an NYU college student who was being stalked on the internet and the seemingly unrelated murder of a real estate agent who was living a dangerous double life.

Before I became a criminal law professor, I was a prosecutor, where I worked directly out of a precinct for two years. I like to think that law enforcement culture is a living, breathing character in my books. One aspect of that culture is the contentiousness of relationships between line investigators like Hatcher and Rogan and supervisors like Lt. Robin Tucker and prosecutors like Max Donovan.

The challenge of fictionalizing those relationships is to avoid the gruff-toned barks of bad-TV lieutenants and the unctuousness of TV prosecutors. In 212, Hatcher and Tucker are at odds not because of the usual cop/supervisor conflicts, but because they’re both women used to being the smartest person in the room. And part of the reason Tucker’s amused by ADA Max Donovan’s precinct pop-in is her suspicion that Ellie has Donovan have a little something on the side.

What’s less than representative about page 69 is that it shows only law enforcement characters. Although precinct culture serves as the backdrop for 212, it does so by providing the canvas upon which more colorful scenes play out. In 212, Hatcher gets a glimpse into the lives of New York City’s uberwealthy and is pulled into a sex industry that has been mainstreamed by technology. To soak in those components of 212, the reader would need to turn the page to 70.
Watch the 212 video trailer, and learn more about the book and author at Alafair Burke's website and blog.

The Page 69 Test: Dead Connection.

The Page 69 Test: Angel’s Tip.

Check out the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Saturday, April 10, 2010

"He Walked Among Us"

Norman Spinrad is a science fiction icon and the author of more than twenty novels which have been translated into over a dozen languages. His 1969 novel, Bug Jack Barron, was nominated for the Hugo and Nebula Awards and his short fiction collection, The Star-Spangled Future, was a National Book Award finalist. He has also written screenplays for American television series, including the original Star Trek.

He applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, He Walked Among Us, and reported the following:
Page 69 is not representative of He Walked Among Us . No single page or even chapter would be, since the novel is written from four diverse points of view. A science fiction writer. A sleazy talent agent for sleazy comedians. A New Age lecturer and sometime actress. And Foxy Loxy, a far gone crack addict street girl and hooker. The prose of each of these viewpoint characters reflects their diverse consciousnesses, and that of Foxy Loxy is the most extreme and extremely divergent. Like most of my novels, the style or styles is that of the viewpoint characters themselves, and in something like He Walked Among Us, with four viewpoint characters and four different styles, four different subjective realities, nothing is representative of anything else. As Amanda's mantra puts it, "What is, is real."
Learn more about the book and author at Norman Spinrad's website.

Check out the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Friday, April 9, 2010

"InterstellarNet: Origins"

For thirty years, Edward M. Lerner toiled in the vineyards of high tech. Then, suitably intoxicated, he began writing science fiction full-time. He writes both near-future, Earth-based techno-thrillers (like Fools’ Experiments and Small Miracles) and -- as with his latest novel, InterstellarNet: Origins -- more traditional spacefaring adventures.

He applied the Page 69 Test to InterstellarNet: Origins and reported the following:
We are not alone. Now what?

InterstellarNet: Origins begins with a signal from -- someone -- a few light-years from Earth, and humanity is plunged into turmoil. What do the aliens want? Do we dare to respond? Do we dare not to? Who gets any say in the matter? And if species share technology, how much more chaotically will we all careen into the future?

The issue can’t be faced once and forgotten, because every interaction with the aliens -- and, we soon find out, more than one nearby star harbors intelligent life -- changes everyone. And many of the crises are existential.

Charise Ganes, diplomat from impoverished Belize, leads the countries that resist responding to the original alien message. On page 69 we find Charise confronting Bridget Satterswaithe and Dean Matthews -- ringleaders among those advocating a response -- at the ceremony to mark transmission of Earth’s first interstellar message in reply.
“I didn’t expect to see you today.” Satterswaithe said.

I failed to prevent us from answering. That makes me responsible, too. “Where else would I be today?” Charise paused to glare at the man who had bumped her elbow while squeezing past. “What we do this day is important. We agree on that. And surely, as you expect, in the coming years we will learn many wondrous things. ET will, too. I hope that is all that happens.”

“What else could happen?” Matthews asked.

“I don’t know,” Charise candidly admitted. “Or rather, we don’t know. We can’t know. And yet, like ET before us, we would presume to gamble with the destinies of worlds.”

“Driving a car is a gamble,” Matthews retorted. “Everything we do, every day, is a gamble. ‘I don’t know’ is no reason to stand in the way of progress. What can you possibly be worried about?”

“Not all gambles have the same stakes,” Satterswaithe reminded, softly.

A flicker of doubt? Charise wondered. If so, it came too late to matter.

Hoping she was wrong and certain she was not, Charise said, “What do I worry about? That galactization will prove to be globalization on steroids, and Earth the exploited hinterlands.”
Themes of trust, risk, and unintended consequences resound -- with the stakes higher each time -- for the remainder of the book.
Learn more about the author and his work at his website, Edward M. Lerner, perpetrator of science fiction and techno-thrillers, and blog SF and Nonsense.

Check out the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Thursday, April 8, 2010

"Dark's Tale"

Deborah Grabien is a musician and the author of many adult novels. She lives in San Francisco with her husband, a fellow musician.

She applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, Dark's Tale, and reported the following:
Page 69 of Dark's Tale, my first YA novel, drops the reader in the middle of a clash between the San Francisco police and the Cores, the homeless kids living in Golden Gate Park. More on that in a moment:
That got my attention. I jerked my head toward the flashing lights and felt a tremor as the ground seemed to move under me. There were some heavy things running around down the street, people thudding their feet, more people joining in, more voices, some of them loud and weird, some of them obviously cops.

"Crazy-bad." Rattail shook his head. "They took something, you bet--stuff that makes them do things. Silly Cores. I wonder why they set their own stuff on fire, and rolled it away? I wouldn't do that if I was a Core, or had stuff. Let's go see."

Even in the few weeks I'd been in the park, I'd already become amazed at the way people don't seem to see the world around them. That night was a good example. By the time Rattail and I made it down to the edge of the trees by Marx Meadow, there were already about twenty of us there. At least five cars went by, slowing down to stare at the cops and the Cores. Not one of them seemed to notice the rest of us.

What really got me, though, was the rabbit.

He was the first rabbit I'd seen in the park, and I couldn't for the life of me figure out how he hadn't been eaten yet, or what he was even doing here. He didn't look like anyone's cute fluffy thing with soft ears. The garden next door to the house where the People had lived, there had been a rabbit hutch in their garden, with little pet rabbits. They'd look like stuffed toys, or blankets with feet. And they'd smelled like food.
I should probably point out here, that that last sentence makes more sense if you realise that Dark, the narrator, is an abandoned housecat. The Rattail she's watching with, her friend, is a raccoon.

Dark's Tale was written after ten years of working with the homeless cats in Golden Gate Park, every night, as part of the SPCA's TNR Program. Over the years, my husband and I have become essentially as invisible as the night-prowling animals themselves: neither the park police nor the homeless population pay us any mind. We feed the cats - and sometimes raccoons, mice, and skunks - under a blanket of darkness that's more than simply the night. Most people, driving through the park at night on their way home, are oblivious to the animal world around them.

The story is about trust, and survival: when, after being stripped of your reason to trust, can you believe what your instincts tell you? How, if you seem invisible, do you come to believe that you're real, that you matter, once again?

Hard questions, but I think Dark's Tale - based on a real cat we fed - takes a reasonable shot at showing the possibilities. Give it a read. Besides, don't you want to know more about that rabbit...?
Learn more about the book and author at Deborah Grabien's website.

Visit the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

"Master of None"

Sonya Bateman lives in upstate New York, where there are two seasons: winter, and construction. Her home is shared with a husband, a son, three very strange cats, and a gerbil with half a tail. She enjoys reading and swimming, and wishes there were some feasible way to combine the two.

She applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, Master of None, and reported the following:
“Tension on every page” – that’s what I learned at Donald Maass’ Writing the Breakout Novel seminar many years ago, and it’s stuck with me ever since. When I’m writing, I try to keep things moving constantly. I don’t believe in breaks. I love reading a story that keeps me breathless until the end, so that’s the type of story I try to tell.

I was pleased to see that the Page 69 Test bears out my intentions. Things are definitely moving.

By page 69, my protagonist, an unlucky thief named Gavyn Donatti, has already discovered the existence of the djinn, been shot at, threatened with guns (twice), learned he has a two-year-old son he’s never met, gotten pulled over by a dirty cop, betrayed by his ex-girlfriend, and watched a friend die. At this point, he’s been brought to the basement-slash-torture-dungeon of Trevor, the man he was supposed to steal a certain item for, that he has since inexplicably lost.

It only gets worse from here:
I was so dead.

Trevor stopped in front of me. “Mr. Donatti.”

“Present.”

He jammed the Taser against my thigh and pulled the trigger.

I went limp. Fortunately, the rope held me up. He kept the jolt short, and when he pulled back, I gasped, “Jesus Christ. Aren’t you supposed to ask me a question first?”

Trevor shook his head as if he was disappointed. This time, the damned thing juiced the side of my neck.

The charge exploded in my head, blinding me. My mouth opened. No sound emerged. I figured smoke would start billowing out, but saliva foamed over my lip and dribbled down my chin instead.

This was Trevor’s subtle way of telling me to shut up. It worked. Couldn’t speak if I wanted to.

“If you had my item, Mr. Donatti, you would have given it to me by now.” His voice wavered and splintered against my pounding eardrums. “Eventually, you will explain what happened. I’m not ready to question you yet. At this point, your job is to listen.”

“Listenin’,” I slurred, slopping more drool onto the floor.

Trevor zapped me again. I screamed.

“You believe if you don’t cooperate, I’ll kill you. I won’t. You believe if I leave you alone long enough, you’ll find a way out. You can’t. You believe torture is the worst thing that can happen to you, and death is preferable.” He moved in and brought his face inches from mine. “It isn’t.”

I believed that.
Read Chapter One of Master of None, and learn more about the book and author at Sonya Bateman's website.

Watch the Master of None teaser trailer.

Check out the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

"The Long Man"

Steve Englehart is best known for writing for such series as The Avengers, Captain America, and The Fantastic Four (for Marvel) and Batman and The Justice League of America (for DC), and for his novel The Point Man, the first Max August novel.

He applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, The Long Man, and reported the following:
Page 69 of The Long Man is actually pretty representative of what I'm trying to do with this series (which began with The Point Man, also from Tor) - in that I posit a world that is our world, with the one small addition that a few people have mastered the skills of magick - and those skills are actual skills which most anyone COULD learn. So when the subject of zombis arises on page 69, Max August can explain how zombis are made, in plain English (and a little French).
They don't need science; they have art. And lots of uninterrupted time for trying things out. Puffer fish venom's just the main ingredient in a zombi potion. They also use the leaves of the consigné tree and the tcha-tcha bean, both of which slow the rate of the body's functions. That's mixed with leaves from the bresillet tree and bwa pine, maman guepes and mashasha, pois gratter and pomme cajou and calmador, all of which cause severe itching and irritation. That last part's sort of to taste; it's where the artistry comes in. But the zombi master gets some of this potion on his victim, the victim starts scratching, and soon he's opened up a dozen sores. The poisons enter the bloodstream, his energy sinks from brain to body, et voila, as they say in Haiti.
Jason Bourne has arcane skills and knowledge that amaze us, and so does Max; it's just that the skills and the knowledge are in different areas. The thing is, Max has those skills and Bourne's, too, making The Long Man a 21st-century thriller.
Learn more about the book and author at Steve Englehart's website.

Check out the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Monday, April 5, 2010

"Shadow Princess"

Indu Sundaresan is the author of The Twentieth Wife (2002); The Feast of Roses (2003); The Splendor of Silence (2006); and In the Convent of Little Flowers (2008).

She applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, Shadow Princess, and reported the following:
Shadow Princess is the third novel of my Taj Mahal trilogy—set in 17th Century India. The first two, The Twentieth Wife and The Feast of Roses are based on the life of Mehrunnisa, Empress Nur Jahan, who was the daughter of an impoverished Persian immigrant, and who consequently, upon her marriage to Emperor Jahangir, became the most powerful woman in the Mughal dynasty.

In 1612, a year after Mehrunnisa enters the Mughal harem, she facilitates the marriage of her niece, Mumtaz Mahal, to Jahangir’s son, Khurram who becomes Emperor Shah Jahan. This is where the story begins in Shadow Princess. In June of 1631, Mumtaz dies in childbirth. By her side are her oldest daughter Jahanara and her husband. Shah Jahan has been emperor for only three years, coming to the throne after a bloody war of succession when he kills one of his brothers and a few cousins.

Inconsolable at his wife’s death, Emperor Shah Jahan considers giving up his empire. He mourns for a whole week, neglecting his duties, and finally, on Page 69, appears at the jharoka balcony in front of the nobles. (Mughal emperors gave audience thrice at these balconies every day—morning, noon, and night. These were casual appearances; they also held court twice a day.)
…his face was aged, the hair on his head more white than they had imagined.

“Padshah Salamat!” they shouted, their voices petering into nothing.

This was not Emperor Shah Jahan…They glanced at one another. They bumped shoulders. They gazed at the man on the balcony, their master, with a steadiness unbecoming to servants of the Empire.
Later on Page 69:
Her heart thumping, Jahanara leaned against the opening of the jharoka, out of sight of the men below…Bapa would speak very little during the jharoka…this much he, and previous Emperors, had decided would be the practice at these appearances. So how...to convince them that the man who stood before them was their king?

Even as she thought this, Jahanara felt a warm flush cover her face, for she had in her own mind created a doubt, or rather picked up on it from the outside.

“What is happening?” said Dara in a low voice.

“I don’t know.”

“They think…” But he did not finish his sentence; he could not either.
It is Jahanara who rights this situation, by sending her four brothers out onto the balcony to flank their father in support. She cannot go herself; she’s a woman, living behind a veil and the walls of her father’s harem.

Shah Jahan continues to rule the empire for another twenty-five years and during that time builds a tomb for his wife Mumtaz, the Taj Mahal. And just as she had in this early scene, seventeen year old Princess Jahanara will become the quietly influential woman upon whom the emperor leans for the rest of his life. Jahanara attempts to put Dara on the throne after their father, falls in love with a noble at court, and engages in a rivalry with her sister Roshanara. In the end, all these events—and that Luminous Tomb her father builds for her mother—cast their long shadow upon Jahanara’s life.
Browse inside Shadow Princess, and learn more about the book and author at Indu Sundaresan's website.

Visit the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Sunday, April 4, 2010

"The Fallen"

Mark Terry is the author of three Derek Stillwater novels, The Devil's Pitchfork, The Serpent's Kiss, and The Fallen, as well as two standalone novels, Dirty Deeds and Dancing in the Dark. In addition, he is the author of Catfish Guru, a collection of mystery novellas, numerous short stories and literally hundreds of magazine and trade journal articles.

He applied the Page 69 Test to The Fallen and reported the following:
So, the urban legend says, flip the book open and read page 69, and if it’s good, read the book. In my novel The Fallen, this places us outside the Colorado Springs resort where the G8 Summit is about to start and told from the point of view of a secondary character, Russian FSB Agent Irina Khournikova. She and a fellow Russian agent are watching as the various world leaders are flying into the resort on helicopters, and she is thinking about a terrorist group, The Fallen Angels, that she is concerned will somehow attack the summit.
….She had become an expert—as big an expert as anybody on the planet, she supposed—on The Fallen Angels, the name of Andarbek’s group of operators. They headquartered in the Georgian mountains, bought or stole weapons, sold them to whoever needed or wanted them.

Over time they evolved into something else, a weird cultlike group of apocalyptic terrorists.

The first of the helicopters—Marine One—that carried the president of the United States and his staff, settled onto the expanse of lawn in front of the Cheyenne Center. A marine honor guard stood at attention, and a small military band played ‘Hail to the Chief’ as President Langston deplaned, waving to a small contingent of the press.

Irina glanced upward at the roofs of the buildings, mentally checking off the Secret Service sharpshooters she saw at different points of the compass. She shifted her gaze to the Secret Service guards who walked alongside the president in their dark suits, eyes covered with sunglasses, bodies stiff with the focus of their attention.

President Langston stood listening to ‘Hail to the Chief,’ and when it was finally finished, he saluted and led the U.S. contingent through the entrance of the Cheyenne Center.

Another helicopter landed, then another, and another.
So, is this representative of The Fallen? I would say yes and no. The Fallen is very much an action-filled novel. The main character, Derek Stillwater, is undercover at the resort where the Summit is being held when the terrorist group, The Fallen Angels, takes it over, holds 20 world leaders hostage and threatens to kill one per hour if their demands aren’t met. Derek spends the time in the crawlspaces, corridors, heating and cooling vents, and elevator shafts, fighting his own guerilla war against the terrorists. From a high concept perspective, The Fallen is “’Die Hard’ at the G8 Summit.”

This selection on page 69 is scene setting. It gives us a sense of who Irina is—she’s an important character—and an overall sense of the drama and complexity and scale of the G8 Summit. It also allows me to provide some background on The Fallen Angels from Irina’s point of view, which is slightly different from Derek’s point of view. Still, it’s a piece of the whole, and I hope you enjoyed it.
Read chapters 1-6 of The Fallen, and learn more about the book and author at Mark Terry's website and blog.

Check out the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Friday, April 2, 2010

"The Tale of Halcyon Crane"

Wendy Webb is editor in chief of Duluth-Superior magazine. A journalist with two decades of experience, she lives in Minnesota.

She applied the Page 69 Test to The Tale of Halcyon Crane, her first novel, and reported the following:
I love this concept! When readers get to page 69 of my novel, The Tale of Halcyon Crane, they've already been through the first phase of the plot's setup: Our heroine discovers that everything she has been told about her life — who she was, who her parents were — was a lie. She learns that the mother she thought was dead for 30 years was actually alive until very recently, and her father, upon whom she doted, had abducted her all those years ago. She travels to her mother's home for answers, and on page 69, she is just beginning to find them.

On page 69, Hallie takes her first steps into the home where she lived as a child, a home that now belongs to her. She is greeted at the door by her mother's two dogs, giant Alaskan malamutes, Tundra and Tika. People who know me are touched when they read this, because I happen to have a real-life malamute named Tundra, who joined our family after our beloved dog Tika passed away suddenly. One great thing about being a novelist is having the ability to put these two wonderful dogs together in a story, even though they never were in life.

The page ends with the line, "So, these were my mother's dogs." She has found the first real connection with the mother she never knew — the house, the dogs. In the rest of the book, the stories of her mother and her ancestors unfold, leading Hallie to the answers she seeks. What she finds is at turns delightful, menacing and even terrifying.

Page 69 of The Tale of Halcyon Crane:
Will produced a set of keys from his pocket, unlocked the front door and held it open as I walked through it into my home.

I found myself standing in a large square foyer, the living room on one side, the dining room on the other, and a grand wooden staircase ascending in the middle.

"Where's the welcoming committee?" Will looked left, right and up the stairs. "Girls! Tundra! Tika!"

I heard a clatter of toenails on the wood floor, and two enormous dogs burst through the swinging door separating the dining room from what I assumed was the kitchen. They looked like huskies but were much bigger, their thick white and gray fur, bushy tails, long legs and dark masks around steely golden eyes all hinted at ancient timberwolf ancestors. One was carrying a twisted rope bone in her mouth; the other had a stuffed rabbit. The dogs wiggled and curled around our legs, their great tails wagging, ears pinned back in greeting. Will was scratching and petting them in return, murmuring: "Good girls! Such good, good girls!"

One of them, the bigger of the two, jumped up on me, putting one saucerlike paw on my shoulder and the other on top of my head. I was afraid to move. "They're friendly, right?"

"Down, Tundra!" Will commanded and the dog dropped to the floor and sat in front of me. "She loves visitors. They're the highlight of her day. And yes, they're both friendly, but protective, too."

I reached down gingerly to scratch this beast behind the ears. "So, these were my mother's dogs."
Read an excerpt from The Tale of Halcyon Crane, and learn more about the book and author at Wendy Webb's website and blog.

Visit the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue

Thursday, April 1, 2010

"In the Company of Angels"

Thomas E. Kennedy was born in New York. He has lived in Copenhagen for over two decades, and has worked, among other things, as a translator for Copenhagen's Rehabilitation Centre for Torture Victims. He is the author of over 20 books including novels, as well as several collections of short stories and essays, and has won numerous awards including the Eric Hoffer Award, the Pushcart Prize, the O. Henry Prize and the National Magazine Award.

He applied the Page 69 Test to his novel In the Company of Angels and reported the following:
Marshall McLuhan chose page 69 as his test sample page of any book someone is considering reading. I’ve never tried the page 69 test myself; while there is something to be said for the occasional refreshment of arbitrariness, in excess it can be capricious and unreasonable. I prefer my father’s ten-page test; when we didn’t want to sit still for him to read a book to us, his rule was that we listen for ten pages and then, if we wanted, we were free to go; invariably, however, by page ten, we were hooked.

How does the page 69 test fare with my own recent novel, In the Company of Angels (Bloomsbury, 2010)? In fact, that page shows one of the least central characters in the novel, a young lawyer named Voss Andersen, at an official dinner in the process of getting drunk; by itself the page shows little of the significance of the scene unfolding for the narrative flow of the book.

Of the six characters portrayed within In the Company of Angels, the two most central are Bernardo “Nardo” Greene, a Chilean torture survivor being treated in Copenhagen’s torture rehabilitation center, and Michela Ibsen, herself the survivor of a violent marriage. And the central question, I suppose, is how to open to love in a world tainted by evil and violence? Neither of these central characters appear on page 69 of the novel – well, Michela is glimpsed for one sentence – and that central question is beyond formulation in Voss Andersen’s callow consciousness; it will take him most of the book to even scratch the surface of an awareness of love. Each of the six characters in the novel approaches the question at his or her own pace in accordance with his or her own state of development and his or her capacities.

It takes all 288 pages of the book for the drama to unfold in fullness. Page 69 – or any other arbitrarily chosen page – will not suffice. But the first ten pages would be a good place to start.
Learn more about the book and author at Thomas E. Kennedy's website.

Visit the complete list of books in the Page 69 Test Series.

--Marshal Zeringue