The Thursday Friend Trivia Quiz

Answer: London

This was a big change for Catherine Cookson; she and her husband went to London on their honeymoon, and in her telling of an episode in Hannah's life visited many different places in the nation's capital.

Answer: 23 Buttermere Close

The book opens when Hannah visits her sister to unburden herself about the terrible state of her marriage; her husband slept in a different room, went out every Thursday night without fail, and disappeared to visit his elderly relatives every weekend.

Answer: Natasha Gillyman

Natasha was Gilly's wife, while Janie was Hannah's elder sister, and George was Humphrey's uncle. Peter was David's manservant/friend whose support throughout the story was invaluable to both David and Hannah, especially to the last when their lives were in danger.

Answer: to play Bridge

Although later in the book we learn that his weekends were spent with his mistress, at no time do we find that his Thursday evenings were spent any way other than that which he told Hannah, that he played Bridge with his work friends. Thursdays were to feature prominently throughout the story, it was the focal point of each week, even after Hannah left Humphrey to live with David.

Answer: she had sciatica

Hannah would visit her sister every Sunday, but on this occasion David came as well. Having previously arranged to meet that afternoon, Hannah was compelled to telephone him to cancel as Janie was laid up and her help was needed - he joined them after dinner.

Answer: mini-skirt

Only ten years old, Maggie was the product of the times; the eldest of four children, she was expected to help with the younger children and was subjected to the different forces of the 1960s pulling her in every direction. She was a complex character - child, teenager and adult rolled into one.

Answer: she bought clothes for herself

Never able to buy new clothes, Hannah spent every penny and a further £20 on clothes in a small shop called 'Yvonne's' off Oxford Street. This was to transform her appearance and so take her one more step along the road to self-assurance.

Answer: Lord Pillbeck

David told Hannah when Pilly left after his one and only visit during the story: 'You have just met a man who has ruined more marriages with a final dart from his bitter quiver than there are days in the month,' and Peter added, 'If I'd followed my own inclination, I wouldn't have let him over the doorstep, because he'll never change.

He's been bad medicine all his life, and I don't think he's ever left a house of friend or foe without leaving ruin behind him.'

Answer: his aunt

Eight weeks after Hannah met David, a phone call came out of the blue from Mrs Drayton and there followed a strange conversation and a visit to the elderly couple, who told Hannah that Humphrey had maligned her to them, and had not been spending the weekends with them at all.

Answer: Daisy

Mrs Drayton suspected that Daisy Beggs was the other woman involved in Humphrey's life, and investigation proved this to be so. The couple had just had their second child.

Answer: at his uncle's funeral

Mrs Drayton wanted Hannah to attend the funeral and will-reading, but Humphrey did not (he obviously wanted to keep the women apart so his lies could remain hidden). Hannah did not attend the funeral, but was there at the reading, which was when Humphrey came to realise that both his aunt and his wife knew all about Daisy and the children. Hannah had been left £50,000 by his uncle.

Answer: he tried to strangle her

Against advice, Hannah went back to her home to get some personal possessions (that weekend she had already moved a lot to David's flat), and it was here that Humphrey found her. After threatening to tell his aunt about Hannah's own affair, he phoned her to tell her, and found out that Hannah had already told the old couple all about it. If the taxi driver had not intervened, she would have been killed in his outpouring of rage over frustrated hopes.

Answer: David's wife

With a family history of insanity, Carrie was still 'at large', and a dangerous prospect for the young couple. Refusing point-blank to give David a divorce, she had threatened to kill him more than once.

Answer: Peter

After Peter had let Maggie into the flat, he did not replace the chain on the door, and Carrie was waiting for him when he returned to the kitchen. Taken off guard, he was unable to raise the alarm, and after he had been felled, Carrie went to the bedroom where she shot David and attacked Hannah. Maggie, alerted by the screams, brought Peter round and together they knocked Carrie out and tied her up. David was to recover, albeit in a wheelchair, and Hannah was fine, as was her unborn baby, but Peter was to die slowly from his head wound, finally leaving the couple and their child when the baby was just a week old.

Answer: Welshy

We don't actually get to meet Welshy, just to hear of her. The list of those who attended the wedding is a far cry from the number people known and counted as friends by Hannah at the beginning of the book, and shows how far she had travelled in less than a year.