Authors Q-S: 'S' Trivia

1. What item of clothing does Larry accidentally take while in a coffee shop, mistaking it for his own?

From Quiz Larry's Party

Answer: A Harris tweed jacket

Larry realises the jacket belongs to someone else when he puts his hand in the pocket and notices it is empty, and that the sleeves are longer. The jacket also has leather buttons and is more expensive and of better quality than his own jacket, which he wears to college every day. Although he enjoys the feel of the jacket at first, he feels guilty about wearing it in case someone finds out it was stolen, and takes it off and stuffs it in a bin.

From Quiz "Ghost Story" by Peter Straub

Answer: Don Wanderley

In the prologue, Don is travelling across the country with a mysterious young girl who he has kidnapped. We don't find out too much about her but we do find out that Don is both scared and feeling guilty for what he's done. He tries to find out about her and asks her about her family and her name. She seems not to be afraid of him at all, at some points even mocking him.

From Quiz 'Duet' by Carol Shields

Answer: Anita

The Gill family spent Martin's sabbatical year in Birmingham, in a flat belonging to another family, the Spaldings, who went to stay at an English school in Cyprus. Anita, their daughter, had left a letter for the tenants, which Richard had found, and the two had become pen pals. Richard is very secretive about his correspondence with Anita, and worries when the letters stop coming. Judith wonders if it might be because of a postal strike in the UK, but it is actually because John and Isabel Spalding have divorced, and Isabel and Anita are living in Cyprus. When John later comes to stay with the Gills, he says that Anita read the letters out at teatime, and that he himself is writing a novel about a family based on the Gills.

From Quiz Siegfried Sassoon

Answer: World War I

Born on September 8, 1886, Sassoon was a soldier who was decorated for his bravery on the Western Front in World War I. Once, he single-handedly captured a German trench on the Hindenburg Line and scattered the German soldiers. He was awarded the Military Cross on July 27, 1916. His poems critique the war by detailing its horror and satirizing those responsible for England's involvement.

From Quiz Cordwainer Smith

Answer: Psychological warfare

Linebarger was on the faculty of Duke University when World War II broke out. He joined the Army and helped organize its psychological warfare department.

From Quiz Tom Sharpe's 'Wilt'

Answer: Lord of the Flies

Wilt takes classes of apprentices, such as butchers, secretaries and printers, at the fictional Fenland Technical College (a.k.a. 'the Tech') and often teaches them about books, an endeavour which he considers to be a waste of time. In some classes, he doesn't even talk about the book and just lets the apprentices talk amongst themselves (such as the incredibly gruesome conversation the secretaries have about capital punishment). He actually threatens to make the printers read 'Lord of the Flies' if they don't behave. In one class, he gets into an argument with a printer, who punches him in the face.

From Quiz 'White Teeth' by Zadie Smith

Answer: In a motorcycle accident

Clara's white boyfriend Ryan is a mod, and detested by the other girls at her school. He befriends Clara's mother Hortense, a strict Jehovah's Witness, after she invites him in and gives him Jamaican food. Ryan asks Clara to get on his motorbike and tries to convince her to change her ways and become more religious, but Clara refuses, insisting she'd rather be a goat than a sheep. While they are arguing, Ryan's motorbike crashes into a lamp post, and Clara's top teeth are knocked out.

From Quiz That Certain Smile

Answer: Dominique

Dominique, a young girl of eighteen who has just left school, tells the story, which is her story. She is on the threshold of an affair with an older married man, and she tells us her innermost thoughts and feelings as things develop between them.

From Quiz PERFUME: The Story of a Murderer

Answer: She sold fish

Grenouille's mother was selling fish in a Paris market when she went into labour. Grenouille was her fifth baby, though his mother claims the other children were stillborn or died at birth. Expecting Grenouille to succumb to a similar fate, she abandoned him amongst the fish offal and carried on with her daily business.

From Quiz Wings of Fire: Moon Rising

Answer: Morrowseer

When Moon is having a conversation with Darkstalker, he wonders why she is such a disaster with her powers. When she asks who trained him, he says him father (Prince Arctic) taught him how to use his powers. It was then she remembered her own father's name - Morrowseer, who died in the volcano eruption. Her mother had never told her; she had read her mind and detected the name.

From Quiz Lines from "The Best of Robert Service"

Answer: The Cremation of Sam McGee

While there is no town named Plumtree in Tennessee, there is a Chinese restaurant in Knoxville named Plum Tree. "The Cremation of Sam McGee" is one of the poems most often recited in bars in Alaska, both by entertainers and patrons.

From Quiz "Dragonwyck" by Anya Seton

Answer: Her mother gets a letter of invitation for either of the Wells girls.

Wealthy Patroon Nicolas Van Ryn writes a letter to his distant kinswoman, Mrs. Abigail Wells (Miranda's mother). In the letter, he simply invites either one of Mrs. Wells' daughters to visit Dragonwyck in the role of occasional companion to his daughter Katrine. Miranda is determined to go, and eventually convinces her reluctant father to allow her a chance at Dragonwyck.

From Quiz "The Wolves of Mercy Falls" - Characters

Answer: Grace

Grace Brisbane was one of the main characters for the first three books ("Shiver", "Linger", and "Forever"). When she was a child, the wolves, who were actually werewolves, pulled her from her tire swing and dragged her out into the forest. They would have killed her, but one of them became a human and saved her. Afterwards, she was sick and would have turned into a werewolf, but her father accidentally locked her in his car on the hottest day of the year while she was sleeping in the backseat. The incredible heat kept the wolf inside her at bay, but eventually, at the end of "Linger", she was forced to become a wolf or she would have died. At the beginning of "Shiver" she met Sam, who was her favorite wolf and the one who had saved her so many years ago. They almost instantly fell in love. Despite their difficult situation, with Sam, and later Grace, becoming a wolf in the cold, they were desperate to stay together. Grace was a very smart and practical girl. Because her parents were so busy with their own lives and staying out late, she mostly took care of herself.

From Quiz Mumsey Once Said: "We Need To Talk About Kevin"

Answer: A Wing and a Prayer

Travel R Us is the travel agency Mumsey got a job at after she had to sell her own company. Lonely Planet is a travel guide book company that exists in real life and in the book it is mentioned to be a competitor to her A Wing and a Prayer company. Before I was born she used to travel the world even though she never really enjoyed it; it is possible that it was a reaction to her own mother's mental inability to leave her own house as she, Mumsey, was growing up.

From Quiz Mystic and Rider

Answer: Senneth and Tayse

Senneth is a powerful mystic or magic wielder. She is also an intimate of King Baryn. In his own way as powerful as Senneth, Tayse serves in, and is one of the best fighters of, the king's elite guard known as the King's Riders. As often happens with strong personalities, the two don't get along well at first. Justin is the other Rider. Kirra and Donnell are shape shifters, while Cammon is a sensitive or 'reader', what we might call an empath.

From Quiz "The Bronze Horseman" by Paullina Simons

Answer: Aleksandr Pushkin

In the book, the poem is one of Tatiana and Alexanders' favorites, and they quote lines from it often. The poem deals with death and the great city of Leningrad itself: "The little houses are bent down, Some - shifted, some - razed to their ground By awful forces of the waves; The bodies, waiting for their graves, Are lying round, like aft fight, merciless."

From Quiz "Dies the Fire" - A Novel of "The Change" (Part 1)

Answer: March 17th - St. Patrick's Day

It takes a little while to discover the full ramifications of 'The Change', but in a nutshell, electricity stops working, combustion no longer works (gunpowder, explosives, gasoline engines, etc.), and even steam power falls off before it can become truly effective. S.M. Stirling wrote another series of three books, called the "Nantucket" series, in which a mysterious 'Event' sends the island of Nantucket back in time to circa 1250 BC. The 'Event' from that novel series is the catalyst for what happens in this "Emberverse" series. And March 17th, 1998 is when it happens in both series. The truth behind this is not discovered until well into the "Emberverse II" series (set 22 years after 'The Change'), and all anyone knows of the connection at this point is news of strange weather and light phenomena occurring over Nantucket - then (at 6:15 pm Mountain) - everything changes. The books of the "Nantucket" series are: 1) "Island in the Sea of Time" (1998) 2) "Against the Tide of Years" (1999) 3) "On the Oceans of Eternity" (2000)

From Quiz The Twelve Houses

Answer: Senneth, Tayse, Justin, Kirra, Donnal and Cammon

"The Twelve Houses" eventually grew to include five books: "Mystic and Rider," "The Thirteenth House," "Dark Moon Defender," "Reader and Raelynx" and "Fortune and Fate." Books 1-4 of the series follow the friendship and adventures of these six companions. "Fortune and Fate" tells a related tale in which the original protagonists play supporting parts. Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy Pevensie, their cousin Eustace Scrub and his friend Jill Poll feature in "The Chronicles of Narnia" by C.S. Lewis. Frodo Baggins, his cousins Merry Brandybuck, Pippin Took and Fredagar "Fatty" Bolger are hobbits. Sam Gamgee, Frodo's servant cum squire cum friend and Rosie Cotton, Sam's sweetheart, are also hobbits. They appear in "The Lord of the Rings" by J.R.R. Tolkien. Hermione Granger, Ron and Ginny Weasley and their twin brothers Fred and George and of course Harry himself are characters in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series.

From Quiz "The Scorpio Races" by Maggie Stiefvater

Answer: Thisby

Thisby was a small island in the Atlantic, though it was not specified where. The nearest land was referred to as "the mainland". Skarmouth was the name of the town it was set in. Puck and Sean both loved Thisby and would never leave.

From Quiz The Weird and Wonderful Will Self

Answer: Behind his knee

In the man's story ("Bull"), the unusual growth appears behind his knee, but he is told by his doctor that it is a regular wound. The doctor later comes to his home and makes questionable advances. The woman's story ("Cock") finds her using her newly grown appendage to abuse her husband. An early publication for Self, "Cock and Bull" set the tone for much of his work, creating absurd and bizarre scenarios and setting them in a bleak realist world. It also features elements of violence and sexuality which come up frequently in Self's writing.

From Quiz One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

Answer: "the man with the moustache."

Censorship in the Soviet Union was strict and encompassed all of Soviet society. This included personal letters between people, and in 1944-1945 while writing to a school friend about Joseph Stalin, Solzhenitsyn was arrested. The authorities viewed certain remarks as disrespectful, even though Solzhenitsyn had tried to disguise their discussion of Stalin by describing him as "the man with the moustache." He was sentenced to eight years.

From Quiz "A Thousand Shades of Blue" by: Robin Stevenson

Answer: she got hit by a car

Rachel was four and Emma was six. They were crossing the street with their parents and, when they got to the end of the block, Emma pulled away and back onto the street. A car hit her.

From Quiz Miss Skeeter from "The Help" by Kathryn Stockett

Answer: Miss Hilly and Miss Leefolt

They have been best friends since they went to Power Elementary school together. Her favorite photograph of the three of them is them in junior high, sitting in the football stands shoulder to shoulder because they are close friends. The stands were empty around them. In college at Ole Miss, Miss Hilly and she were roommates for two years before Miss Hilly left to get married.

From Quiz The Blind Men and the Elephant

Answer: An American lawyer, businessman and poet (1816-1887)

Saxe began his writing career as a satirist but concluded his writing with serious poems, influenced by the many personal tragedies in his life.

From Quiz Zecharia Sitchin's "The Lost Book of Enki"

Answer: 7

In their system of numbering the planets are numbered from the outermost to innermost.

From Quiz The Witches of Karres

Answer: Illyla

Illyla's father sends Captain Pausert on a trading mission. While on his way back, he buys three slave girls because they were being abused. Unfortunately, that gets him into trouble with Councilor Onswud, Illyla's father, because buying slaves is illegal in Nikkeldepain.

From Quiz Death With Interruptions

Answer: New Year's Day

On New Year's Day, no-one dies. Although car crashes cause incomprehensible damages on this day, there are no fatalities. The country carries on as it did before, but no funerals are held and no bodies are buried. Notoriously, the Queen Mother remains on her last breaths, eternally, as she lays in her bed. When this odd news spreads, the world discovers the truth that death no longer has a say. Life continues eternally. The churches are concerned. With no death there is no resurrection and there is no church. Funeral services and undertakers have taken to performing ceremonies for family pets whether their deaths are natural or accidental. Even retirement and Eventide homes have taken on a new approach. With no-one dying, senior citizens must renew their life insurance past eighty. Once at this age, legally, they have their first death. This can be renewed another eighty years down the line. Surgery is performed with no risks. A world without death. Fancy that.

From Quiz Moscow Rules

Answer: Art restorer

At the beginning of the story, Allon is restoring "Martyrdom of St. Erasmus" by Nicolas Poussin on behalf of the Vatican.

From Quiz "The Foreshadowing"- Marcus Sedgwick

Answer: Alexandra

"Sasha" is a nickname given to her by her mother.

From Quiz Red is for Remembrance

Answer: Porsha

Everyone believes that Porsha is crazy and she even begins to believe it herself. Stacey manages to get through to her and helps her deal with her nightmares by helping her practice magic.

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Last Updated Dec 21 2024 5:47 AM

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