"Books of Blood" Vol. 1 Trivia Quiz

Answer: Words of the dead carved into human flesh

The story used to commence Clive Barker's short story collection, aptly titled "The Book of Blood", outlines the creation of the Book of Blood. This narration follows psychic investigators, searching a supposedly haunted house at Number 65 Tollington Place. For weeks, the walls of a second-floor room have been taking a beating as the dead have used it to communicate messages from beyond the grave, from famous people, such as John Lennon and Janis Joplin, to relative unknowns, etching their dates of birth and death into the wallpaper. Simon McNeal, a newcomer to the world of psychic abilities, has been spending time in the room during the writings while Mary Florescu and her assistant, Mr. Fuller, wait downstairs, listening intently as the sounds of the dead emanate from above. What they don't know, however, is that Simon is a phony. For weeks, he has spent time in this room, banging on the walls for about half an hour every day to mimic the dead.

When Simon stops to rest, however, the trio soon realizes that the barrier separating the physical world from the highway of the dead is opening.

While Mary and Fuller are downstairs, they hear as a vase in the forbidden room shatters, and Simon is cut with these shards. Slowly, the room around them lights up, and as Fuller begins to make his escape, he is killed when he opens the front door, unable to witness the panoramic view of the highway of the damned. His soul joins the millions making their way to the intersection that is 65 Tollington Place while his blistered corpse slides to the floor in the doorway. Mary remains in the living room, knowing that nothing can be done to save the boy upstairs. Though she knows that he faked his psychic abilities, she can't help but feel for him, being torn and sliced by the undead at all corners of his flesh. As quickly as it begun, the ordeal is over. Mary makes her way upstairs to find a naked Simon on the floor, cuts lining every millimeter of his body like Braille. Some of these are already healed, but some of these will take much longer. When they do, however, Mary vows to read them all with patience and care, so as to translate the words of the restless dead. These stories, carved in the flesh of the Book of Blood, are the stories in the volumes of Clive Barker's works. So begins, "The Book of Blood".

Answer: Kaufman

The story opens with Leon Kaufman as he learns (through newspapers and otherwise) of the famous Subway Butcher, a man who has been killing riders of the New York City subway system. Oddly, all of the victims were killed with an obscure amount of neatness. Leon makes his way to a job he dislikes immensely.
On the other end of the story is a man named Mahogany. He leaves his apartment later in the day for his job. He makes his way to the station at the Avenue of the Americas and looks for a potential healthy victim.
Kaufman leaves work abnormally late and boards a near-empty train. As he begins to fall asleep, Mahogany subdues a youthful person across the car without Kaufman noticing. Soon though, Kaufman wakes up to the sound of chopping and peeks through the open blinds at the car window so behold a terrible site. He has boarded the midnight meat train, and he's heading to the last stop.
Kaufman drops to the ground and hides under a seat as Mahogany and the train's driver walk by. Mahogany returns to his work and Kaufman decides to confront him. In self-defense, Kaufman uses a discarded knife to kill the murderer of the meat train.
When the train stops at a point that's past the end of the line, the car door opens. Kaufman stands in the carnage as odd creatures walk into the car and begin to eat the victims of the butcher. These creatures tell Kaufman that they are the founding fathers of the city and they are protected and prolonged by the butcher and other servants around their lands. To protect their legacies, they cut off Kaufman's tongue and give him the permanent job as the new butcher. The story closes with Kaufman in a new job, though it means an employment spanning his lifetime.

Answer: He imports gherkins

This story mainly revolves around The Yattering, a lesser demon sent by his higher powers to demonize Jack, a middle-aged gherkin importer with a crumbling family. After Jack's wife leaves, his daughters are sent off to college. With no one in the house, Jack is left on his own, and the Yattering finds this to be the perfect situation for himself. Capitalizing of the man's isolation and loneliness, the Yattering begins by tampering with small things around the house, including the lights. Jack pays no attention to this though, which may be reasonable, as they're minor tricks.

However, The Yattering switches his attention to Jack's cat, and the one after it, and then the third one, as time after time, The Yattering decides to kill the cats to get a slight reaction out of the homeowner.

In all fairness, the third cat never really bothered the demon until one particularly stressful day when he decided to make the cat explode. With a simple 'Che Sera, Sera', Jack, seemingly indifferent to the situation, picked up the pieces of his third cat and buried them with the others in the backyard before going to bed.

The Yattering, nearly at his wit's end, spoke with his master, and was told to break the man.

Answer: Christmas

On Christmas Day, Jack's daughters come home to spend the day with their father. On Christmas morning, before sunrise, The Yattering throws Amanda, Jack's eldest daughter, out of her bed. Although Jack calms her down before they all go back to sleep, the incident leaves the daughter shaken. That evening, while preparing for Christmas dinner, Amanda takes the brunt of the second attack.

This time, The Yattering uses the family's Christmas Turkey, pulling it out of the oven and having it fly around the room. Jack and his other daughter, Gina, come in to see the commotion, but end up saving Amanda in the process, pulling her into the hallway and blocking the kitchen door before the possessed/cooked turkey can unleash its fury. Jack maintains his cool though, saying that nothing is out of the ordinary.

As he proceeds upstairs, The Yattering initiates its final plan. While Amanda sleeps on the couch, Gina sits next to her in the living room and watches as small pieces of decor and furniture begin to spin. Shortly after, the larger furniture begins to spin as well until the tree takes up the most space with its rapid twirling.

When Gina yells for Jack to come downstairs, he quickly ushers them to the door, calmly saying that nothing is out of the ordinary before his TV explodes. Gina, shocked at her father's comment, yells at him, but he quickly walks to the door, claiming he needs fresh air. As he walks away, The Yattering beats him to the door, bolting it shut. The two of them fight over the locks for a few minutes as Gina watches the mysterious circumstances, and at one point, Jack makes a run for the back door. Although The Yattering beats him, Gina takes the opportunity to unlock the door, take Amanda outside, and leave it open for Jack. Jack manages to make it outside to the front gate, but The Yattering follows him and grabs him, breaking the two cardinal rules bestowed upon him. Jack knows that he won, and reveals he knew the whole time about the motives of his personal demon, and because The Demon broke the rules, he must serve Jack against his will.

Answer: Wood Shop Teacher

Redman arrived at the Remand Center for Adolescent Defenders having lost his job on the police force. With his new position on the staff at this academy, he would need to maintain order amongst teenage delinquents. After being given a tour of the grounds by Mrs. Leventhal, he spots a boy named Lacey being beaten up in the yard outside.

When they reach the boys, Redman has a connection with Lacey upon looking into his eyes, and realizes that there may be something important about him. The other boys call him the 'pig', knowing that he was once on the force.

As time goes by, Redman teaches wood shop class to the boys and they grow to accept him into their academy. As Redman explores the grounds one day, he makes his way to an old, dilapidated farmhouse on the edge of the yard and searches around.

He notices a horrible, yet distinct odor here, but doesn't think much into it, feeling that it's from the fact that the place is so unkempt. As he heads to leave, he notices a rather large pig near the barn, and he notices that it has been fed fresh meat.

He leaves it in silence. When he goes back inside, he finds a few of the boys chasing Lacey through the hospital area of the academy and he runs into the boy to stop him. The other boys claim that Lacey is always running away, but Lacey states that Henessey has been chasing him. When Redman inquires about this to Leventhal, she says that it couldn't have been true, as Henessey was a boy who escaped the academy, and would not have returned. That night, while Redman speaks with Leventhal, two boys go to the barn with food scraps to feed the pig. While they serve the beast, it tells them that it craves Lacey's meat. The boys are forced to comply, and they vow to bring Lacey the following night.

Answer: In a sty

The following day, Lacey ends up going to Redman's office to ask a favour. He asks Redman to deliver a letter to the office and place it directly into the delivery bag as the academy reads and checks all outgoing mail. During their talk, a boy named Slade informs Redman that he has a phone call in the office. Redman asks Slade to watch Lacey as he takes the call, and he agrees. Redman finds the phone, but finds the line dead.

As he makes his way back to the classroom, he finds that Slade is the only one there, and he claims that Lacey ran off again. Redman doesn't buy this though and demands to know where the boy is, but Slade takes a pocketknife and attacks him. During their fight, Redman accidentally throws Slade at the wall, causing him to unintentionally impale himself on the blade.

As Redman rushes to find Lacey, he reads the letter, and finds that Lacey knew the boys' plan to feed him to the pig after all. Redman rushes to the barn and finds the boys and Mrs. Leventhal inside.

They let him in, realizing that he had to know eventually. They explain that the giant pig is actually the boy who 'escaped', Henessey, and he never really escaped in the sense that was thought. Instead, he hanged himself in the barn, feeling that he could become immortal in this way. The other boys, who all looked to Henessey as a role model and friend, served him since that date, and Mrs. Leventhal had a romantic affair with the boy shortly before his hanging. Redman asks where Lacey is and the boys point to the sty behind the pig before telling him that if he wants to save Lacey, he has to get past them first. Redman acts fast and knocks Mrs. Leventhal into a nearby candle, setting her on fire and lighting the straw around the barn. As the boys and the pig run around the flaming building, Redman rushes in to Lacey in the back and finds the boy in the room with Henessey's hanging corpse, half eaten by the pig and decayed over time. They rush to the only place they know they can find a working phone, the administrator's office, but find him inside with his heart eaten out. As Redman walks to the phone, he takes a blow to the head and passes out. When he wakes up, he finds himself hanging from the ceiling. He watches the doorway as Lacey rides in on a charred and burnt Henessey. Unable to move and flee, Redman watched as the pig stopped in front of him, and he felt his first jolts of pain as Lacey took the first few bites from his flesh.

Answer: Twelfth Night

This story begins with aging director, Terry Calloway, as he prepares for his performance of William Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night". Although he is preparing for this in the prestigious Elysium Theater, the play itself is lacking. His starlet, a young soap opera actress with no talent off the camera, isn't playing the lead role of Viola with any emotion. No one is on cue during rehearsal and things just aren't getting done.

He gets by with an affair with his leading lady, Diane. One day, as the rehearsals continue, Calloway thinks he sees a man in the audience, and he's right; it turns out to be a man named Lichfield, who tells Calloway later on that he enjoys the performance, as it will be the last one at the Elysium before it is torn down by the theater's accountant, Hammersmith, who figures that it's for the best.

He also states that his wife, Constantia, played the same role as Diane, and perfected the performance. On the other hand, Diane is lackluster, and brings shame to the role.

He advises Calloway to fire her. As Calloway leaves the theatre that night, he speaks with the elderly woman who looks after the ticket booth and mezzanine, Tallulah, who says that she remembers the stunning Constantia's performances in the Elysium when she was such a little girl, but Constantia tragically passed away. Lichfield, however, was a lover of the arts, and tried to preserve it in his love for it, so he would naturally be concerned about the play. After Calloway leaves, Lichfield makes a visit to Tallulah, and brings Constantia with him. In the following days, Diane still brings the play down, yet Calloway doesn't fire her. As he's about to have a word with her, Lichfield interrupts at the doorway and asks to speak with Diane personally. When Calloway leaves, Diane discovers that Lichfield isn't who he seems to be. She notices an odd peculiarity about his face and tears at the man's skin to reveal that he has been wearing a mask the whole time. Lichfield forces her to give in and gives her the kiss of death, knocking her unconscious, and relieving her of her role as Viola.

Answer: None

As Diane is taken to the hospital, Calloway's search for a new Viola doesn't take long. Lichfield introduces Calloway and Hammersmith to Constantia and they are immediately enamored by her quick performance so much so that they immediately cast her, despite the first show being given the following day. Lichfield insists on a few ground rules though; the stage lights must be from the front of the stage, aiming upwards, and no one is to physically touch his wife during the performance. Calloway agrees to this, but find it odd.

The following day, Lichfield speaks with Tallulah and offers her death so that she can survive on in the wake of the theater's destruction. She agrees and he gives her the kiss of death as well before placing her in the green room. Calloway waits in his room before the performance and Diane returns saying that she had to make a choice between the play and their love.

She says that she is fine with being left out of the performance, but she came for him instead.

When Calloway realizes that she isn't breathing, she stabs him in the ear with a nail file from her purse. The play begins to a full house and the actors make a grand performance. In the meantime, Calloway makes his way to Hammersmith's office and breaks his neck as revenge for his antagonism. When the play finishes, it is a success. The cast returns to the stage for their applause and bowing, and Calloway cleans himself up before the finale. As they take their bows, Diane runs to the stage and unknowingly places her hands on the sides of the hot stage lights, burning her skin. As the cast rushes to stop her, they look past the blinding lights at the audience and realize that the seats are held by corpses of the nearby cemetery. Before they can react, a fire breaks out in the theater. During the play, Tallulah had awakened and started a blaze from the props of the previous performances. No one survives the blaze, and the cadavers return to their graves. In the end, a select number of individuals, Calloway and Tallulah included, make their way across the country with Lichfield and Constantia as a theater troupe, planning their next performance and location, continuing on for their love of the arts.

Answer: Yugoslavia

This final story of the first "Books of Blood" volume follows Mick and Judd, two gay newlyweds, as they take their honeymoon through Yugoslavia. Both are finding themselves incompatible, and they take a break by pulling over in a rural area and thinking it out.

They rekindle their love in a nearby field and decide to make their way to the next city as opposed to hitting the next museum down the line. While the two of them sleep, two small cities, Popolac and Podojevo, wake up early and begin their festivities. Every ten years, the cities construct large bodies out of their own bodies. Lashing themselves together with supports and ropes, their bodies act with the same mind to move these large creatures about. One city is led by a leader who is experienced while the other, Podojevo, has a new, young leader. Both of the cities set out for battle while Mick and Judd decide to go into the hills of Yugoslavia for their trip.

Answer: Podojevo

As the two cities crash like thunder through the Yugoslavian hillsides, Judd and Mick drive through the forests. Finding that they are lost, they end up at the nearest town and stop the car. As one of the cities falls in its battle, a wave of blood pushes the car back and the two get out to investigate. What they find is the mass of citizens of Podojevo, most of whom are still tied together, in a jumbled mess strewn about their city. Most of them are dead. Judd and Mick realize that they need to leave to find help, but when they turn around, Podojevo's organizer flees with their car.

Although they chase after them, they are unable to catch up. They decide to trek back the way they came to retrieve their vehicle. They find it crashed into a tree and they continue onwards back to the city, but along the way, they find a small farmhouse and seek refuge there with an older couple.

In the night, however, the group is woken up to the thundering crashes of Popolac walking through the woods.

It makes its way to the house as Judd and Mick reach the front door and it comes crashing down on their one refuge. Judd is killed in the destruction, having been hit by debris. Mick, discovering the sheer enormity and wonder of the magnificent city makes a final leap into the mass and crawls his way through the body of Popolac, becoming one of its many pieces, and following along with the city.