23 June 2020

Book Lovers’ Quiz

By nonfictioness


I’ve really enjoyed writing quizzes based on my Miscellany books over the last few weeks (if you have missed them you can try my museum quiz here and my library quiz here) so for my final foray please find my book lovers’ quiz! The answers are here in a separate post. Do let me know how you get on either on Twitter @nonfictioness or in the comments below. Enjoy!


1. Match the writer with their nom de plume:

Real name                                                           nom de plume

Stephen King                                                     George Eliot

Anton Chekhov                                                O. Henry

Mary Ann Evans                                               Mary Westmacott

William Sydney Porter                                   Man Without a Spleen

Agatha Christie                                                 Richard Bachman


2. All three of the following series contain the same total number of books in them, but how many books are in the series (bonus point if you know the technical name)?

Olivia Manning’s Fortunes of War series

Frank Herbert’s Dune series

Anthony Trollope’s The Chronicles of Barsetshire.


3. Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak was published in 1958 but was immediately suppressed by the Stalinist regime who accused him of maligning the peasants’ struggle. What year was the book finally published in Russia?

a) 2010

b) 1966

c) 1999

d) 1987


4. Devil May Care by Sebastian Faulks, Solo by William Boyd and Colonel Sun by Robert Markham are all continuation novels (sequels written by another author) inspired by which hugely popular series of books?


5. What was the name of the film that was based on the 2005 book Q & A by Vikas Swarup?


6. What do Sanditon by Jane Austen, The Mystery of Edwin Drood by Charles Dickens and The Original of Laura by Vladimir Nabokov have in common?


7. Some writers have been especially young when their debuts were published, while others were notably old. Put the following writers in order (youngest to oldest) by their age at first publication:

Bret Easton Ellis (Less than Zero)

George Eliot (Adam Bede)

Percy Bysshe Shelley (Zastrozzi)

Richard Adams (Watership Down)

Anna Sewell (Black Beauty)

Frank McCourt (Angela’s Ashes)

S. E. Hinton (The Outsiders)

Mary Shelley (Frankenstein)


8. Dame Barbara Cartland was an extremely prolific writer, not only penning numerous romance novels but also writing cookbooks, plays and poetry. How many books did she write during her career?

a) 77

b) 177

c) 523

d) 723


9. The longest book ever written is the 17th century romantic novel Artamene ou le Grand Cyrus by Madeleine de Scudéry, but how many words did it have?

a) 570,000

b) 3.8 million

c) 1.3 million

d) 2.1 million


10. Which book is the all-time bestselling work of fiction?

a) Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by J. K. Rowling

b) A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

c) The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown

d) The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien


11. To produce a Bible on vellum in the Middle Ages the skin of roughly how many calves would be required?

a) 23

b) 170

c) 89

d) 320


12. Name the writer and book title of these famous first lines:

a) ‘All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.’

b) ‘It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.’

c) ‘It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents…’

d) ‘The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.’


13. Match the classic Penguin paperback cover colour to the type of book it denoted:

Jacket colour                                                      type of book

Orange                                                                 biography

Green                                                                   travel & adventure

Cerise                                                                   fiction

Dark blue                                                             crime fiction


14. How many rejections did Margaret Mitchell receive for Gone with the Wind before finally securing a publishers and going on to sell over 30 million copies?

a) none

b) 12

c) 73

d) 38


15. The following is the last line from which famous novel?

‘And the ashes blew towards us with the salt wind from the sea.’


See the answers here.

If you enjoyed the quiz and are left wanting more fabulous bookish facts why not buy a copy of The Book Lovers’ Miscellany here.

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