By PJ Parrish
Now that I have your attention…
No, I am not going to talk about sex again. Not even bad sex with a limp penis, which as we writers know is a helluva lot more fun than good sex. I want to talk about finding the heart of your story. And to do that, you have to try this little exercise:
Get out your book or call up your Word doc manuscript. (For our purposes here, “book” means published or un, completed or not. “Book” is that thing that has been keeping you up lately.)
Open it to page 69. Read what is there. I don’t care if it’s a full page or the last two lines of a chapter. (If you hit a blank page, you have permission to use either 68 or 70 but that’s as much cheating as I allow.)
This page — this single page — capsulizes your entire book.
You don’t believe me, do you. I didn’t believe it either until I tried this experiment. I did it a couple years ago at the request of Marshal Zeringue, executive director for the Campaign for the American Reader. Marshal has this terrific blog wherein he promotes reading. Sez Marshal: “The goal of this blog is to inspire more people to spend more time reading books. I’ll try to do that by shining a little light on books that I like and think others might find worthy of their time and attention.” CLICK HERE to see his blog.
He also came up with the Page 69 Test. He was inspired by Marshall McLuhan’s suggestion that you should choose your reading by turning to page 69 of a book and, if you like it, read it. Zeringue tried it with Richard Dawkins’ The Ancestor’s Tale, and was so taken with the results he devised the Page 69 writers challenge.
On his blog, Zeringue has asked dozens of writers to answer the question: Is your page 69 a good place to get a sense of your book?
When I first picked up Marshal’s gauntlet, it was for our book AN UNQUIET GRAVE. (CLICK HERE to go read those results) But the other day, I decided to apply the test to our newest book, so I cracked open SHE’S NOT THERE, which was just released this month. Here is our page 69:
“When you call her phone, does it ring before it goes to voice mail?”
Tobias shook his head. “The police told me the phone was turned off. They said that’s why they couldn’t use the GPS to find it.”
“They can trace the phone’s last location. Have they told you anything?”
“Yes. They said her last known location of the phone was about two miles from where her car was found. But they never found the phone or her purse.”
“What about the car’s GPS?”
“It doesn’t have one.”
“And you don’t know where your wife was going?”
Tobias shook his head slowly. He picked up his glass, staring down into it for a long time, then finally took a drink.
“What do you know about the accident?”
“Not much. They said the car spun off the road in the Everglades.”
“Everglades?” What was your wife doing driving alone in the Everglades?”
Tobias stared at him for a long time, as if he were trying to figure something out. Then he shook his head. “I don’t know.”
What the hell did this guy know?
Here’s what has happened before this. A woman wakes up in a hospital, bruised and with a concussion. She has no ID and can’t remember how she got there. All she had on when she came in was a Chanel dress and a 10-carat diamond. But when she hears her husband’s voice (Tobias), she freaks and bolts from the hospital, sensing he tried to kill her. The husband has hired a skip tracer to bring her home and the tracer is interviewing the husband for the first time. Does it give a good sense of the book? Oddly enough it, does. As truncated as it seems, the passage crystalizes a main plot point. The skip tracer suspects Alex Tobias, a rich lawyer, has something to hide, and he knows that every marriage has dark currents running beneath. So the skip tracer’s final thought on that page — what did the guy know? — is the existential question behind the whole plot. This is a husband who actually knows nothing about his wife. Which is why he might have tried to kill her. Or not.
I have to say that I went into this experiment a skeptic and emerged a believer. When I first did this years ago, I thought it was a bunch of hooey. But I think it reveals a kernel of truth about both our books. Each passage, in its way, gets to the heart of our story.
Okay…back to your own page 69. How does it work for you? What is there on this one single page that somehow serves to represent the very heart of your book? Think hard. It’s there. If it’s not? Well, maybe, just maybe, you haven’t really found the heart of your book yet.
Let me know what you found out. Be brave and share your 69s here and let us be the judge!
Postscript: I am on vacation this week, roughing it in the wilds of the Loire Valley. I wrote this before I left and I think I will be able to answer. If I can’t…talk amongst yourselves! Also, our book is finally out..The South Florida Sun-Sentinel critic Oline Cogdill calls it “captivating.” Author Hank Phillippi Ryan, calls it “Taut, tense, and twisty—this turn-the-pages-as-fast-as-you-can thriller is relentlessly suspenseful.” Here’s the LINK.
Well, I’ll be damned. Pg 69 of my upcoming release – The Last Victim is from the killer’s point of view and encapsulates the essence of the cat & mouse game with my FBI profiler. Very cool, Kris.
Excerpt
Seeing Ryker up close fueled an adrenaline rush of excitement. The federal agent stood outside the Point Baker post office with a stern expression on his face as he thumbed through his cell phone, checking messages and killing time.
Killing time. They had that in common.
Ryker looked bored. If he’d come to the island for excitement, he’d come to the right place. Having the FBI’s lead investigator at Point Baker made it feel like the moth flitting perilously close to a warm flickering death, but who was the flame—and who would play the part of the oblivious insect?
The Totem Killer smiled.
What a great idea. Here’s an excerpt from my page 69, also from the killer’s POV:
When it all got to be too much, drought or flood, low yields and lower prices, broken equipment or not enough money to pay the crop duster, find a way. Release the burden without hurting those who struggled alongside you.
That’s what his dad taught him. Like when Mom canned the vegetables in the pressure cooker. If the stress got too high, everything exploded. It’d happened once when he was a boy. The relief valve on the heirloom appliance got clogged and the lid blew off, sending clouds of steam through the kitchen. Mom’d been burned on her arm, but not bad. Could’ve been a lot worse.
Pressure builds till whatever’s holding it in can’t take it anymore, then it’s got to get out, one way or the other. That’s the natural way of things. Whether it’s in the kitchen or in an engine or in a man. Best to control the explosion. Stop it before it happens and hurts the ones you love.
Dad was a whittler. When things got bad, he’d sit on the porch, part of a thick oak branch in one hand, his old Buck knife in the other. He’d sit out there for hours, shaving that wood down to nothing. No fancy designs or little animals. Just keep going until it’s gone. Then he’d go to the barn and sharpen the knife, stick it in his pocket, and get back to work.
You knew not to bother Dad on those days. Let him whittle the worries and anger and stress out of his system. Get his mind straight so he could focus on farming. And he’d passed the knife on to Mason, its woodgrain handle worn to a yellowish tan from years of use. Just as sharp as ever though. Only one problem.
Mason hated whittling.
Sounds like a cool way to “find” your short summary as recimmended by JSB the other day…
As to the topic at hand, I’m not that far along with my current WIP, but I did try this against my current RIP (read in progress), which i just started, and I’m a little distressed to see things don’t transition a whole lot by the time I get to page 69 – though it is a paperback, so maybe page 69 happens a little further in because of formatting… :-). Here’s hoping~
Kris, I tried your test and opened to page 69 of our latest Sholes & Moore thriller, THE TOMB. It’s only a partial page but goes right to the central conflict of the story in a conversation between the protag and the antagonist. It reveals my protag’s deepest fear and starts the ticking clock. Couldn’t ask for more. Here it is.
“Locate the object within the allotted time and you’ll get Agent Gates back. Don’t deliver it, and you won’t. It’s that simple.”
“How did you get my cell number?”
The woman laughed. “You’re not dealing with drug smuggling morons now, Agent Decker. I wouldn’t suggest you waste time sleeping. Two days will go by quickly. We wouldn’t want time to run out and your former husband winding up joining the Delgado brothers, would we?”
Before I could answer, the line went dead.
I need to make sure Eugene buries that Mexican today. Could those other Mexicans have fled the county without being detected? Do they even exist? Who killed Burnett? Is Vandella lying to me? Why would he? Who took the money and the dope? Why haven’t I heard from Luis?
Roy’s cellphone rang.
“You find my money, Roy?”
“No, Johnny I haven’t. All I’ve found is two dead bodies and one’s a deputy. A decorated veteran of the Iraq war. You know anything about that?”
“I don’t know nothing about no dead deputy. All I know is I got ripped off and I want my fucking money back and I will get my fucking money back. That’s all I know, Roy.”
“Is that right? You got ripped off?”
“Yeah, you heard me. I got ripped off.”
“The evidence at the scene of the accident is contrary to your statements.”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
“It means I believe your hoodlums chased down the Mexican causing his death from a single vehicle accident. They then took the money, dope and killed my deputy.”
“No. What that means, is that you suck as a detective.”
“Is that right? I suck as a detective? Well then you suck as the leader of an organized crime syndicate. You let a couple of Mexicans rip you off. As a white man, let alone a criminal, you ought to be ashamed of yourself. If you’re lying to me, what happened was, you stole the money and the dope and left two dead bodies to rot in the sun. One a deputy, the other one of Guzman’s muchacho’s. That’s not too smart, Johnny. As a matter of fact, it’s pretty fucking stupid.”
This is an interesting test. I haven’t gotten to page 69 yet in my WIP, but I’ll keep this in mind. 🙂 By the way, I haven’t read your books yet — I need to check them out.
Wow. At first I thought it was like a card trick–you know, “Is this your card?” But I tried it on my last two books and doggoned if it didn’t work. Now I’m going to peek at page 69 for everything I write in the future. No fair!
You are wise man, Doc. I used to do close-up magic and could use mathematical tricks to force a card on someone. This page 69 trick works not because of some other worldly spirit force, but because of super structure!
In genre fiction, by page 69 you are past the Doorway of No Return #1. You are into Act 2, and therefore are going to be writing about the conflict, perhaps even what I call a Kick in the Shins. You’re not going to be giving a lot of backstory or exposition. The story has taken off.
Therefore, practically anything on page 69 can be spun into the overall arc or meaning of the story.
In The Hunger Games, for example, page 69 is right before Katniss and Peeta enter the arena while she is wearing her dress of fire. Just before they go through the door, Peeta reaches out and takes her hand. That, of course, can be said to be the essence of the story, that Peeta and Katniss will survive together and so forth. But you could take virtually any page on either side of that and spin a little bit different meaning.
The length of the novel matters, too. Page 69 of Gone with the Wind isn’t anywhere near Doorway #1, but it does have Gerald O’Hara talking about the inevitability of war. You can make an argument about that being the main trouble of GWTW.
IOW, the page 69 test can be a good check for the author to make sure he’s writing something of moment and not just spinning wheels. But structural knowledge is what is really “behind the curtain.”
Here is page 69 of ROMEO’S RULES:
The phone rang.
“May I?” I said.
“Back off,” he said. And then he made a mistake. He poked me with the baton.
The phone rang a second time.
I snatched the baton out of his hand. I grabbed his thumb with my other hand and controlled all three hundred pounds of him. I stuck the baton point up under his chin.
The phone rang again.
His back was to the dispersing crowd. His girth hid what I was doing. I said, “I’ll give this back to you if you just let me take this call. And no one has to know.”
A fourth ring.
“Answer me now,” I said.
“Sure,” he said.
I stepped back and handed him the baton and answered the phone, keeping my eyes on him.
“Hello?”
“Michael?”
“Hi, Ira.”
“Where are you? I’ve been frantic. I’ve been—”
“I’m in town.”
“Where? Why aren’t you—”
“It’s better you don’t know.”
“What?”
“I’ve been treated rather rudely,” I said. I gave a nod to Baton Guy. He frowned, but did not come at me again. “The rude people will be wanting to find me,” I said. “And they may come calling on you.”
Jim beat me to it (he gets up earlier than me), but he’s right (as usual). Like any card trick, there is a logical reason, and it applies when the author has written a book that aligns with solid story structure, or as Jim puts it, super structure. It’s super because it works so well. Let me put this in the cold hard language of story structure, which aligns completely with Jim’s “doorway of no return.”
That is what I call “the first plot point.” It is, in my view, the most important moment in a story, since it launches (turns the corner, pushing the hero through that doorway) the core dramatic arc, which until that moment has been “set up” in the previous pages (what I call the Part 1 quartile). By page 69, you’re either right on the brink of that, or it’s already recently happened, or in some cases I’m sure, it’s right there. Why? Because the optimal range for this to appear (there are no “rules” of course, but this is a guideline) is from the 20th to 25th percentile. There’s wiggle room on that, but not all that much (for example, if you have your FPP on page 20 you may have short-changed the critical setup and foreshadowing that is incumbent on the first “quartile”).
Whatever language a writer uses to understand and accomplish this (sometimes it’s instinct), a pro almost always aligns a book with this in a structural sense. And if they don’t, an editor who gives feedback on the sense of stakes and establishing empathy for the character, or that it takes too long for the story to kick in, will likely cause the writer to do a revision, and the result of that revision will be — voila! — the placement of that important moment (FPP, doorway of no return, there are bunch of names for it, but it remains the key moment in the story) somewhere in that range.
Very cool perspective on this, PJ.
Okay, now I’m even amazed. I went to my novel, “Deadly Faux,” and there it was… the First Plot Point… the doorway of no return… right there ON that very page. Like Joe’s example, it’s a chapter ending (which is often what the FPP looks like, the zinger at the end of a chapter). Since you invited this, here it is:
p. 69 of Deadly Faux;
I nodded. Two swimmers were doing laps in the adjacent pool, and I wondered if there was any technology on earth that might permit them to listen in while they did flip turns.
“If people start dying, I’m out of there.”
“Fair enough. Just keep the droid close. You’ll do just fine, just like last time.”
“I’m glad you think my ass is pretty, Sherman.”
He shook his head. “Everything you need to know is in the bag.”
We touched fists, just like the big boys on ESPN.
Like a prostate exam from hell, I was about to be digitally inserted into the hot, smelly rectum of American greed and lust: Las Vegas, Nevada.
Gee, just when I was hearing the theme from The Twilight Zone playing in my head, JSB reveals the secret behind this card trick. Thanks, Jim. I intuited something along those lines, but hadn’t pinned it down.
But it’s still a great trick, Kris. I’m going to use it in my next workshop.
You too, Larry! Your comment must have appeared while I was still writing mine.
Yep, we were concurrently praising Jim Bell. Seems like I do that frequently.
Me, too. Don’t you hate it.
Hmmm… my last release, Deadly Production, was a mystery, and on page 69 (that’s in manuscript formatting), the cop is trying to find out whether the dead woman was actually a homicide.
Gordon, not stupid enough to be making a phone call of this nature without being ready with pen and paper, wrote it down. “One more question, Mr. Dawson. Did Marianna Spellman have a laptop with her?”
“I never saw her use it, but who knows what she kept inside that satchel of hers. Although, come to think of it, she must have, because when we went over shooting schedules, and who needed to be where and when, she took notes in longhand, but she gave me hard copies that were typewritten—or keyboarded, or whatever you call it now that typewriters are a thing of the past. They weren’t handwritten, that’s all I can say. How they got that way, I don’t know. She could have used a computer where she was staying and printed them there.”
Gordon was tired of getting non-answers to his questions. “Thank you. I’ll check with the studio.” Before he called, he made a list of topics to cover.
He punched in Ethan Lang’s number, and was pleasantly surprised that Lang himself answered. Gordon had figured that the man’s admin would answer, which was still closer than a main studio switchboard. Points to Dawson for that much, at least.
Gordon identified himself, wishing he could see Lang’s face. Had Dawson prepped him? Was he expecting the call?
“Chief Hepler, I assume you’re calling about the tragic death of Marianna Spellman. Do you have any news you can share?”
“I’m sorry, not at this time. We’re still investigating. But it would help us if you’d answer a few questions.” Gordon tapped his pen beside the first item on his list.
“Of course.” Lang’s voice sounded sincere, but without the benefit of body language, or seeing facial expressions, Gordon took the usual cop position that people lied to cops. “I want to get to the bottom of this as much as anyone. Marianna was a valuable asset to any production she worked on, and she’s worked on three previous pictures for us. She will be missed.”
“I’m going to record this conversation,” Gordon said. “For everyone’s protection.”
“I understand.”
Gordon switched the phone to speaker and set up his recorder. “You said you’ve dealt with Miss Spellman before, that this would have been her fourth film for your studio. Does this mean there are others who are working on the current film who have worked with her in the past?”
“Yes, she’d worked with a number of people from our studio. In this business, paths cross.”
“Would any of them have been on location in Mapleton?” Gordon asked. Despite the recording, he made notes as they spoke.
“I doubt it, although I’d have to have someone pull the records of the other films. In most instances, we have dozens of behind-the-scenes people—technical and support crews—working on a project. More in the studio than on location for budget purposes, and we’ve tried to cut things as close to the bone as possible on this film because of the charity angle, so we have a skeleton crew.”
“Yes, I’ve heard that.” Gordon followed a thought that Lang’s comment triggered. “When you say skeleton crew, are you talking about this location shoot, or the movie itself?”
“Both,” Lang said. “We’ve sent as few as possible to Colorado. Only those who are indispensable.”
“Would you have a list of everyone involved on the production? It might help.” Gordon wasn’t sure how, but maybe something would pop. Always better to have things you didn’t need than need things you didn’t have.
“I can arrange to have it sent,” Lang said.
Gordon gave Lang his email address, then continued. “We’ve been unable to find a laptop in Miss Spellman’s on-site office or in her lodgings. Do you know whether or not she brought one with her?”
“I would assume so.”
“But you can’t be certain?”
“Did I personally see her pack it up? No. Her assistant might know, but he’s left for the day.”
Wow. It works. Whew. I was sweating bullets after I read the comments. LOL But there it is. Here’s page 69 from Marred…
“He…called…back.”
As if a ghostly intruder was stabbing him in the heart, he swallowed a lump and didn’t react. “Start slow and tell me exactly what he said.”
“He asked me…” Her voice faltered. “He asked if I wanted to live forever.” She let out a squeal as if she was physically hurt and collapsed on his lap. “What’s that mean?” He had never heard this phrase before. She wiggled up to his chest, her arms hooked around his waist, and raised her jade-green eyes.
This woman’s eyes melted his heart every time.
“I don’t know,” she said, but her words didn’t match her tone. “He knew what I was writing. How’d he know?” She pressed a closed fist to his chest. “How did he know?” She buried her face in his arm, her back heaving, belly cries muffled by his dress shirt.
“Did you email Jess, run the story by her like you usually do?”
She quieted, a teardrop dangling off one of her thick lashes. “Yes, but she said she never received it.”
Lifting one cheek off the sofa, he dug in his back pocket and passed her his handkerchief. She honked her nose and passed it back. With two fingers, he held the handkerchief at arm’s length and tossed it on the coffee table. Love or no love, there are some things you don’t share.
“Show me.”
She gave him a look like a doe frozen in the headlights of a fast approaching Mack truck. “What?”
“Show me the email. Where’s your laptop?” He scanned the room. Her Chromebook was on the kitchen table. Finger by finger, he unlatched her hands from around his waist and headed for the kitchen. “What’s your password?”
She leaped off the sofa. Flat hands flew straight out in front of her. “Wait. I’ll do it.”
Too late. He was already reading the story. The Chromebook in his hands, his sight glued to the words on the screen, he rotated to avoid her. Sage continuously attempted to get in front of him and snatch the computer away.
Obviously something was in here she didn’t want him to see.
Shoot. Some of the formatting didn’t paste over. Ah, well. This was fun!
I have two WIPs – this is from UNDER ONE FLAG which takes place in 2065.
Reading the page I thought how mundane it is, but the MC has been involved in crap in her professional life all day and her personal life is about to get ‘examined’ in the following chapter. So mundane, yes, but the MC really needs a breather.
La Clair was not the simple French restaurant Mackenna was expecting. There was a stage across the room from the door. A band of at least twenty in formal wear played what she believed was known as big band music. A woman in an overly elaborate gown and hairpiece adorned with feathers was singing in high soprano. There was a round dance floor with a mirrored ball hanging dead center over it, tables circled it four rows deep. If the scene was in black and white Mackenna would have thought she was in a 1940’s movie.
The hostess took Mackenna to a reserved table which was dead center in the front row. She felt like she was the one on stage herself the way so many people turned to look at her. A waitress, Shawna, brought a bottle of champagne and two glasses to the table, “Compliments of the management. Would you like me to pour or would you prefer to wait for Secretary Bloom?”
“I’ll wait, but I’d like a glass of your house white and a menu, please” said Mackenna.
When the designer, Althena, had brought out the gold brocade gown, Mackenna thought the woman was out of her mind. Althena was certain the gold would just ‘pop’ against Mackenna’s dark skin and she was insistent that, although she had never been to the restaurant herself, the gown was just what the well dressed Secretary should wear. Reluctantly Mackenna had deferred to the woman’s judgment. Now she was glad she had, anything else would have been understated.
Hmm…I got mixed results on this both in sampling my own stories and in sampling published works. But I still think it’s a good test.
Hey wait a minute. The Captcha is penalizing me because I’m great at English and suck at Math…. LOL!
Hey guys!
Sorry I couldn’t be here yesterday when this posted but it was a travel day here in France and I was away all day — had to train-it into Paris De Gaulle airport to pick up friends who are coming down to stay with us this week. I am living near Orleans so what with tram-train-RER-metro-train-tram it took most my day.
But thanks for all these great examples and esp to Jim and Larry for pulling back the curtain on the magic act!