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Quiz about One Book Wonders Second Time Flops

One Book Wonders & Second Time Flops Quiz

Nearly anybody can write one novel, or so reckoned D.H. Lawrence. A second novel, he opined, was "a step farther". These questions are about those who never wrote a second novel, or whose second novels were flops.

A multiple-choice quiz by darksplash. Estimated time: 4 mins.

Author
darksplash

Time
4 mins

Type
Multiple Choice

Quiz #
306,987

Updated
Dec 03 21

# Qns
10

Difficulty
Average

Avg Score
8 / 10

Plays
1576

Awards
Top 35% Quiz

Question 1 of 10

1. Frankly my dear, perhaps you did not try hard enough. Which author wrote a novel that defined a particular time and place in American history, then died before writing a second? Hint

Abigail Adams

Margaret Mitchell

Augusta Jane Evans

Tess Gallagher

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Question 2 of 10

2. Perhaps those cold Yorkshire winters got too much for the author of a memorable tale of love in the dales. Which writer died the year after publishing a novel that has since been immortalised in song and on the silver screen? Hint

Emily Bronte

Elizabeth Gaskell

Eleanor Hallowell Abbott

Beth Henley

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Question 3 of 10

3. Which American author wrote a novel that challenged racial stereotypes and the taboos of its time, and then never produced another during the 20th century? Hint

James H. Cobb

Harper Lee

Thomas Perry

Stephen Frey

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Question 4 of 10

4. Sometimes writers just need a gee-up. Which author started her one and only novel at the age of 51, took six years to write it, and then died within months of publication?
Hint

Anna Sewell

Frances Harper

Delia Bacon

Georgia Douglas Johnson

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Question 5 of 10

5. He may have declared his genius, but the critics found his first novel a little too racy. Who confined himself to plays, poems and short stories ever afterwards? Hint

John Sanford

Oscar Wilde

George Bernard Shaw

William Heffernan

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Question 6 of 10

6. You must be mad to write a novel, but if you are mad, could you write one? Which author wrote a blockbuster then had his next work cruelly rejected by the reading public? Sometimes these things happen. Hint

Douglas Adams

Philip Pullman

Umberto Eco

Joseph Heller

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Question 7 of 10

7. It's hard to get motivated again when your first book is a monster hit. Which author could not scare up more than a few polite reviews for her second? Hint

Isabella Macdonald Alden

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Francis Leslie Ashton

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

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Question 8 of 10

8. Picture the scene. You write a massive big seller and get an $8m dollar advance for a second, which flops. Which novel proved unlucky for Charles Frazier after his hit with "Cold Mountain"?
Hint

Thirteen Suns

Thirteen Worlds

Thirteen Weeks

Thirteen Moons

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Question 9 of 10

9. Some booksellers might have been tempted to file this author's first smash-hit in the 'railway hobbies' section when in fact it should have been in 'recreational drugs'. Which author found that the drugs don't work when he tried a similar follow-up?
Hint

Irvine Welsh

Gabriel Garc�a M�rquez

Danny Baker

Dan Brown

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Question 10 of 10

10. Her tale of love, devotion and triumph over adversity gets readers of a certain type misty eyed even yet. But of whose second novel was the best that could be said was that at least it was a gender bender? Hint

Olivia Ward Bush

Charlotte Bronte

Margaret Fuller

Elizabeth George

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Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. Frankly my dear, perhaps you did not try hard enough. Which author wrote a novel that defined a particular time and place in American history, then died before writing a second?

Answer: Margaret Mitchell

Margaret Mitchell was the author of "Gone With The Wind", the tale of southern dynasties facing the trauma of the American Civil War. It was made into a movie that has featured regularly in lists of the 'best' pictures ever made. Ironically, Mitchell was knocked down and killed by a car in 1949 on her way to the cinema. "Gone With The Wind" won a Pulitzer Prize in 1937.
Pedants' note: The manuscript of a novella called "Lost Laysen" was uncovered in the 1990s and was published in 1996. It was written by the 15-year-old Mitchell in 1916. (GWTW was published in 1936).

Answer: Emily Bronte

Emily Bronte saw 'Wuthering Heights' published in 1847, then died of TB the following year.

3. Which American author wrote a novel that challenged racial stereotypes and the taboos of its time, and then never produced another during the 20th century?

Answer: Harper Lee

"To Kill A Mockingbird" in both its movie and literary incarnations remains on many people's lists of 'best-evers'. Published in 1960, the story of racial injustice in the American south won a Pulitzer Prize. The 1962 movie adaptation won three Oscars.

4. Sometimes writers just need a gee-up. Which author started her one and only novel at the age of 51, took six years to write it, and then died within months of publication?

Answer: Anna Sewell

Anna Sewell wrote "Black Beauty" to promote a more humane treatment of horses. She died in 1878, five months after it was published.

5. He may have declared his genius, but the critics found his first novel a little too racy. Who confined himself to plays, poems and short stories ever afterwards?

Answer: Oscar Wilde

Wilde based some of the characters in "The Picture of Dorian Gray" on himself. When first published in 1890, the critics hated it, but his other body of work led to a reassessment and it later became better regarded.

Answer: Joseph Heller

Published in 1961, "Catch-22", Joseph Heller's WW2 satire, was based on the experiences of US pilots and was well received. However, 13 years later 'Something Happened' crash landed.

7. It's hard to get motivated again when your first book is a monster hit. Which author could not scare up more than a few polite reviews for her second?

Answer: Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Shelley was aged just 18 when she wrote her smash hit "Frankenstein". It was published in 1818. Her next, "Valperga or The Life and Adventures of Castruccio Prince of Lucca", did not catch the imagination. It was never republished in her lifetime.

8. Picture the scene. You write a massive big seller and get an $8m dollar advance for a second, which flops. Which novel proved unlucky for Charles Frazier after his hit with "Cold Mountain"?

Answer: Thirteen Moons

"Cold Mountain" (1997) sold a huge number of copies for Frazier and expectations were high - $8million high - for his follow-up, "Thirteen Moons" (2006). Sadly for the publishers, it failed to sell.

Answer: Irvine Welsh

Welsh's "Trainspotting" (1993) was a big hit and became a stage play and a movie. However, the critics deemed that "Marabou Stork Nightmares" (1995) was just too much more of the same, only not nearly so good.

Answer: Charlotte Bronte

"Jane Eyre" (1847) was Charlotte Bronte's bodice-ripper of a masterpiece. Two years later she published "Shirley", with little success. However, it had a lasting effect in that while Shirley had been a male name beforehand, the Shirley of Bronte's novel was female, and now it is regarded as a typically female name.
All these questions have featured a successful first novel. The remarkable thing was that eight of the first novels went on to enter mainstream culture on TV and the silver screen and most continue to sell well in book form.

Source: Author darksplash

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor gtho4 before going online.
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