Ben Elton's Belting Stories Trivia Quiz

Answer: This Other Eden

In this 1993 thriller Ben Elton takes us to the end of the world as we know it. Yes folks, the planet is dying and the only way to save it, according to the ever-powerful Plastic Tolstoy, is to make it smaller. He builds the Claustrosphere selling units to the rich and the famous so that they could sit back and see out the apocalypse in comfort.

At the other end of the scale is a young filmmaker who just wants to make a movie and show it to the public, while he still has one. He might just succeed, if the eco-terrorists back off from blowing things up. Into the mix comes FBI agent Judy Schwartz who is looking to nail the bad guys... but does the FBI really know who the bad guys are?

Answer: Stark

The Stark consortium can see that the world is going to destroy itself soon. They're looking to escape from the planet and create a colony on the moon. To this end they have been stocking and launching unmanned spacecrafts full of supplies into space. They are now building six ships, called Star Arks that will carry people and animal embryos to a new colony on the moon. But the conspiracy doesn't stop there. They engineer a stock market crash that will build up their wealth and bring the prices of the materials they need crashing down. It also opens the door for them to buy the moon off the US government. Can a group of rag-tag Eco-warriors derail their scheme?

Written in 1989, this was Elton's first novel and it had some critics comparing him with the likes of Douglas Adams. The novel was adapted into a television mini-series (1993), which was directed by Nadia Tass.

Answer: Popcorn

This 1996 satire introduces us to Bruce Delamitri. Bruce shoots movies for a living. At the other end of the scale is Wayne. Wayne, with his partner Scout in tow, shoot people for fun. Bruce is a controversial figure who denies that his violent films are in any way responsible for the evil that people do. Wayne is running out of chances, so he kidnaps Bruce and puts a gun to his head to force him to admit that his films were responsible for Wayne and Scout's killing spree.

Their ultimate goal is to avoid the death penalty.

In the ensuing shoot-out it doesn't work out well for most of the parties whom all, in the end, claim that they're not responsible.

Answer: Post Mortem

Edward Newson is a good detective with a lousy love life. At present he is being baffled by two things; a serial killer who is taking out bullies and how to make it with his very attractive sergeant Natasha, who's already spoken for. In a bid to boost his love life he goes onto a website called Friends Reunited, hoping to hook up with an old school flame. This is where his two bafflements come together as, little does he know, the killer is also hooked into the site, and this is how he locates his victims.

Ben Elton published this novel in 2004, a story that returns him to the form that earned him the Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger Award, which he won for "Popcorn" (1996).

Answer: Dead Famous

The interesting feature about this 2001 whodunnit is that Ben Elton does not reveal the murder victim until he's halfway through the story. Here's the breakdown... The reality TV show is called "House Arrest", there is one house, there are ten contestants being observed by thirty cameras and forty microphones... you are told at the start that one of the housemates is going to be killed off. However, you are waiting until page 200 to find out who it is and how on Earth is the killer going to wrangle this under the gaze of thirty different cameras.

This is a whodunnit that will keep you guessing right until the end where Elton delivers a wonderful little twist. As an aside, and a pointer to Elton's devilish sense of humour, the television production company of the reality series is called Peeping Tom Productions.

Answer: Blast From the Past

At 34 years of age Polly has very little to be happy about. She has no money, no love life and a council job that's as fulfilling as stale beer. Oh, and she has a stalker who has been pestering her for the past two years, ignoring several court orders. One night she gets a call from Jack, a young soldier she had an affair with when she was merely sixteen years of age. That ended when Jack crept off in the middle of the night. Jack tells her that he's never forgotten about her.

Jack is now a four-star general and he has eyes on becoming the next National Security Advisor. Has he come back to reclaim Polly and whisk her away from her dull life? No, he's come back to kill her. You see, if the news of his affair came to light it would have been scandalous... Polly, under US law was too young when they'd had their little "to-do"... she could ruin Jack's ambitions. There is still that stalker to consider but... any more information would ruin this read for you, you may just have track down this 1998 novel for yourself.

Answer: Gridlock

In this 1991 thriller it almost seems that Ben Elton has fired a shot at Margaret Thatcher's determination that roadways, not railways were where the future of Britain lay. A young physicist has discovered a new green energy and the oil companies are out to silence him.

A government is pushing forward an agenda that roads are the way to go. The transport terrorists take matters into their own hands, creating accidents that bring the city of London to a standstill. Throw in a couple of heroes who come to the conclusion that if there was someone out there capable of putting a stop to an entire city, that it wouldn't be too difficult for them to put a stop to them as well.

Answer: Inconceivable

Ben Elton moves away from his usual murder mystery that is intertwined with dark comedy to write a romantic comedy. As with any move to a different style by an author it has the potential to induce a love it or hate it reaction from the readers. This one is no exception.

Sam and Lucy are a married couple. Lucy desperately wants a baby and is trying every possible method to achieve the end result. Sam finds his job at the BBC is no longer kicking goals for him and decides that he should write his own screenplay. Great idea but... he cannot conceive the ideal story for his play. He comes up with the notion of using his and Lucy's infertility and their trials and tribulations as the basis for the story. Lucy hates the idea and tells him not to write it... and you can guess what Sam does... he goes ahead and writes it anyway. Worse, he reads through Lucy's diary so that he can make it authentic.

The film is a hit, Lucy finds out and she leaves Sam. Do they reconcile? Do they finally get their baby? The book became the basis for the 2000 film "Maybe Baby", which had Hugh Laurie as Sam and Joely Richardson as Lucy.

Answer: High Society

The premise of this 2002 novel, which earned Ben Elton the WH Smith's People Choice Fiction Award, is presented early in the piece by the Minister Peter Paget. His view is that Britain should legalize the use of drugs. As part of the plan, the government sets up an approved supply line which takes the drug dealers out of the loop. The war on drugs is over.

Elton then uses the rest of the novel to, essentially, make his case for this argument with a series of seemingly unrelated stories that involve members in all walks of life and slowly intertwine. These range from the drug addicted socialite Emily Hilton-Smith to the seventeen year old Jessie, a runaway who is coerced into prostitution.

Answer: Chart Throb

In this 2006 novel Ben Elton takes his satirical wit and aims it at the pop idol reality style programmes. Calvin Simms is the brains behind the new TV sensation "Chart Throb" and, for him, he's always the big winner. Why? Because he writes the rules.

His wife wants to divorce him and makes a bet with him that he cannot rig the result and anyone she chooses the winner. If she loses, she agrees she won't take any of his money. Think that is going to be easy for Calvin... think again. His wife has nominates the most hated man in Britain, His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, Prince Charles to be the next winner.

The other judges have their own issues. Beryl Blenheim, former rock star-turned-transsexual reality TV star, is juggling the demands of her drug addicted wife Serenity, and a flagging television career that she is trying to revitalize. Rodney Root, a celebrity manager who has seen better days, is also trying to revive his career but finds himself in a position where he is called upon to judge an old flame of his.