To find your perfect novel, see page 69

Musicians have long held that the true worth of an album is to be found at track seven. Marshall McLuhan recommends trying the same trick at page 69. Start in the middle ... a surefire way to find a winner? Photograph: Steven Errico/Getty In his excellent 2006 book, How to Read A Novel: A User's Guide, John Sutherland calculates that, in order to work one's way through Amazon.com's entire collection of half a million novels, one would need 163 lifetimes. That's right - 162 more than any of us will ever get. Clearly, when it comes to reading books, we need to be pretty choosy. But where do we even begin? There is an answer, by the way - and it's 69. A lot of things happen at the point of 69. (Some of them aren't suitable for inclusion in this blog). Man walked on the moon. Bryan Adams had a summer. Evel Knievel died at the age... [read full story]