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issue 38: september - october 2003 

Book Titles

Cryptic clues and little hints but nothing obscure. . . this issue’s quiz is all about book titles.  A 30 euro (£20 / $30) gift certicate to spend at Amazon goes to the winner; in case of a tie, a name will be drawn.  Twenty-six titles in all.   Contest closed  


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Quiz: Good Luck!

1. This classic book from 1962 takes its title from the poem, in four cantos, that appears at the beginning.

2. A young killer gives himself away by later mentioning to a surviving, but crippled, victim the name of a manuscript on the desk at the time of the killings. This manuscript gives its odd name to the book. In the film version the killer reveals himself by singing a Gene Kelly song.

3. This title takes its name from the meat cellar where the protagonist is sent.

4. Transgressive writer who unravels the psyches of his young, gay characters had a cult hit with this title last year.

5. Coming from a prolific American author, who won an award for the novel, this one-word title consists of an object pronoun.

Doubling Up:

6. Odd traveling companions – one American, one British - gave similar titles to their books. A clue to the two titles: find the authors’ surnames: the American shares part of his with the last part of a monster maker; the Brit - colorful, envious rookie?

American title:

British title:    

7. Bad day for thousands of possibly very flummoxed sci-fi fans who thought they were buying the book of the awful flag-waving film.


8. The title a contemporary Scottish writer gave her book harks back to an autobiography set in Africa and from there to a song by Andy Williams from the film of the same name.

9. These novels carry the same title and came out nearly the same year, but her book was about serial killers, started off in London and ended up in New Orleans, while his book was set in London, Paris and Munich in the 40s and 50s and dealt with the ‘obsessive quest for a vanishing woman’.

10. This Scottish, not Welsh, author must have been a little miffed when the title he chose for his third novel was the same as a hit U.S. TV show, a ‘family’ drama set in New Jersey, which had just arrived in the UK to much media attention thanks to its violent nature and colorful language. Name the title.

Sun and Moon Titles
Here you’ll find ‘Sun’ . . .

sunni.jpg (4674 bytes)

11. Also a fiesta?

12. You won’t find sex with car wreck victims in this WWII semi-autobiography set in the Far East.

13. The second in critically acclaimed sci-fi detective series co-starring the android R. Daneel Olivaw.

14. "Undoubtedly much too good to win the Booker prize" was one comment for this book that should really come with a piece of smoked glass for those stupid enough to literally follow the title.


. . . and here you’ll find ‘Moon’
moonn.jpg (4343 bytes)

15. A sprightly author won the Booker with this title.

16. A diamond, which gives the book its title, is stolen. Regarded as the first detective novel.

17. Collection of this author’s early (30s and 40s) moon related sci-fi stories. Did it give David Bowie an idea for a song title?

18. Inspired by the seedier side of Paul Gauguin, this title also mentions an obsolete British coin.

booksto.jpg (10443 bytes)
Forget the title?


A person enters your bookstore and seems to know a little about the book they are after but not the title. Can you help?

19. Everybody was talking about it a couple years ago; there’s this scene where a guy hallucinates about an escaped turd?

20. Oh… the commie one about Napoleon and pigs…

21. The one that has a really gross, obnoxious hero. Title sounds like something to do with the American Civil War. Young author, killed himself ‘cause no one would publish it. Does that help?

22. ..um… ‘M’? ‘L’? It’s a letter of the alphabet by that real reclusive guy…

23. . . . there’s this Indian, a bunch of nuts and Rat Shit?

24. You know, the one that came out recently about the little kid in a lifeboat with a tiger...

25. It’s a collection of stories that came out last year is all I know. The Barcelona Review published a story from it called “The Beginnings of Grief.” Really brill.



© 2003 TBR

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issue 38: september - october 2003 

 
Short Fiction

Ron Butlin: The Mighty Handful Versus the Rest of the World
Alicia Gifford: Surviving Darwin
Ryland W. Greene: What D’ya Know
Sarah Strickley: Annie Has a Thing, Makes Her Crazy
Richard Ailes: The Bounce

   picks from back issues
Anthony Bourdain: Bobby at Work
Bill Broady: In This Block There Lives a Slag . . .

Quiz

Book Titles
answers to last issue’s Literature-to-film - the Sequel

Book Reviews

Night Visits by Ron Butlin
Loot and Other Stories by Nadine Gordimer
Love Me by Garrison Keillor
Tiny Ladies by Adam Klein
Fear Itself by Walter Mosley

Regular Features

Book Reviews (all issues)
TBR Archives (authors listed alphabetically)
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