JUDGING A book by its cover may not be a good idea, but judging it by its 99th page could make perfect sense. According to the novelist Ford Madox Ford, author of the 1915 novel The Good Soldier, “open the book to page ninety-nine and the quality of the whole will be revealed to you”.

The Page 99 test has taken off online and recently saw the launch of Page99test.com, which invites authors to upload page 99 of their work to be evaluated by the site’s readers. We asked some of the customers in Raven Books in Blackrock, Co Dublin, to take a look at the 99th page of an acclaimed Irish novel they’d never read before, to see if it made them want to read more, or throw the book away.

Portrait of the Artist As a Young Man

by James Joyce

The plot: A young Dubliner grows up, struggling with a serious case of Catholic guilt.

First sentence of page 99: "For how miserable will all those pleasures seem to the soul condemned to suffer in hellfire for ages and ages."

Reader’s verdict: Page 99 mostly consists of the sermon about the torments of Hell which terrifies the novel’s young protagonist Stephen Dedalus. Understandably, systems analyst Eoin Armstrong isn’t quite sure what to make of it at first. “There’s no dialogue, it’s all quite abstract,” he says. “And there’s not a hint of plot.” But he’s still intrigued. “I tend to read plot-driven books, but I’m a sucker for good prose,” he says. “This definitely makes me want to read more.”

The Picture of Dorian Grey

by Oscar Wilde

The plot: A dissolute young man remains beautiful, but as his behaviour grows worse, his painted portrait grows more and more hideous.

First sentence of page 99: “As he was turning the handle of the door, his eye fell upon the portrait Basil Hallward had painted of him.”

Reader’s verdict: This is the page where the novel’s eponymous anti-hero first realises that his portrait is changing. It’s a creepy moment, but retiree Hugh McEnaney isn’t impressed. “It’s about a time I’m not interested in,” he says. “It seems to be about people 200 years ago.” He points to a passage half way down the page. “Look at this,” he says. “‘But the strange expression that he had noticed in the face of the portrait seemed to linger there, to be more intensified even.’ It’s a load of rubbish.” McEnaney is definitely not won over – but at least he knows this isn’t a book for him.

Star of the Sea

by Joseph O’Connor

The plot: The books tells of very different lives of the passengers on a ship heading from Ireland to New York in 1847.

First sentence of page 99: “Neither did it matter that they rarely devised fresh melodies, that they simply used the ancient ones that everyone knew; wine-makers pouring this year’s blessings into the beautiful bottles of the past.”

Reader’s verdict: The 99th page of O’Connor’s bestseller didn’t immediately grab editor Helen Carr, who thought it seemed a bit florid. “It’s really nicely written, but it seem all vague description and no substance,” she says.

“But as it went on I realised he was talking about songs, and I recognised the songs he was talking about, so it drew me in a bit more.

“If I’d read the rest of the book and I knew the characters, I might enjoy the initial lyrical passage because I’d know whose viewpoint it was.” By the end of the page, however, she was interested in reading more.

Room

by Emma Donoghue

The plot: Five-year-old Jack, who narrates the novel, has spent his entire life in a single room with his mother, Ma. Ma, who was kidnapped several years before his birth, yearns to escape, but Room and its contents are all Jack has ever known.

First sentence of page 99: “It’s all warm.”

Reader’s verdict: Room’s page 99 is blank, so Aoife Corcoran, busy mother and part-time telecommunications analyst, reads the next page with text, 101. She knows absolutely nothing about Emma Donoghue’s novel, but she’s immediately drawn in.

“I want to know who these people are,” she says. “And I want to know where [the narrator] is from. The writing is very descriptive, and it’s so simple – it almost feels like a child is writing.” I tell her what the book is about.

“That makes total sense,” she says. “He both does and doesn’t talk like an ordinary child – he seems very mature.” In fact, Corcoran is so taken by page that she buys the book.

“I’m definitely going to have to get it now,” she says, heading to the cash register.