Concluding the Bookmarks Quiz Episode

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK . Host unforgettable backyard barbecues with savings from Whole Foods Market. Get the good times going with Made in House chicken or pork sausages and ready to cook kebabs for hassle free flavor. Grab tasty flatbreads and their new balsamic chicken salad in the prepared foods department. Keep things fresh with organic red cherries, strawberries and peaches at their peak , and stock up on bug sprays and sun care must have . Make your summer sizzle at Whole Foods Market. Ever invest in something that seemed incredible at first , but didn't live up to the hype. Like those five dollars roses at a gas station, or a second hand piece of technology that breaks in the first ten minutes ? Marketers know that feeling. We optimize for the numbers that look great, impressions, reach and reacts, but when they don't show revenue , well, that's a not so great conversation with the CFO . LinkedIn has a word for that. Bullspend . Now you can invest in what looks good to your CFO. LinkedIn ads generates the highest ROAS of all major ad networks. You'll reach the right buyers because you can target by company, industry, job title, and more. So cut the bulls spend. Advertise on LinkedIn , the network that works for you . Spend two hundred and fifty dollars on your first campaign on LinkedIn ads and get a two hundred fifty credit for the next one. Just go to LinkedIn. com slash broadcast. That's linked in dot com slash broadcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hello, I'm Claire Balding and welcome to Bookmarks, a brand new quiz for Britain's most passionate book lovers . And in this episode I'll be putting our players to the test on everything from dystopian science fiction to literary love triangles . So let's meet the teams. In the Bookmarks library sitting by the biographies, I'm joined by Alex and Meyer and over by the classics we have Angel and Shaneen welcome. Hello . And Alex, you run an independent bookshop in Swinden, Maya. You're an editor for a leading book industry publication, so I'm guessing that both of you are extremely well read. That's quite a reputation to live up to. I'm quite broadly read, but I doesn't always retain that information. And here's the big question. If you've started a book, do you have to finish it, Alex? Yes. Meyer? No . Life is too short to finish a rubbish b ook. So Maya and Alex, what have you chosen as your team name? If there was a book title that summed up your approach, what would it be? We decided on Scoop by Evelyn War. Because well, we're going to be making headlines. Oh, very good. Yeah. We're not promising what sort of headlines Angel, let's find out a bit more about you. You run a small independent publishing company in Shaneen, you're a keen reader, even keener quizzer. So Angel , on your bookshelves , have you got a coding system for books? I am one of those horrible people who has done my bookshelves by color. Even though I'm a publisher , even though everyone hates . But within the color, you still split for genre, surely. I have had all of my books for so long that I know exactly what the cover looks like. So if I'm looking for a particular book, I can find it in a moment's notice. Shanin, you gasped.. Yeah How's your coding system? There isn't one at all, to be honest. space on a shelf, the book goes there. Some of the books are kind of horizontal because there's not enough space. Which of us is worse? What is your team name? Our team name is Things Fall Apart by Chinua Chebe. It is. And why? Because I think we're going to start really well, hopefully, and then it might tail off at the end. I think this is a bit negative angel, come on, give us some positivity I consider it as I lie dying instead. Oh great . Well, there we are. I'm glad you went for things fall apart . Now, one research study showed that those who read books live almost two years longer than those who don't . But who will ask the distance when it comes to quizzing? Let's find out . So first, round one, plot points. I'm going to ask the teams five book related questions each worth one point and the answers are clues , some of them a little cryptic, but all of them point to the title, plot or author of a different, but very well known book . So there are three extra points up for grabs if you can also name that bonus book correctly. Maya and Alex, so you're going to go first . Your first plot point question is what is the surname of the English writer of novels including A Passionata, Tackle and a Riders? That is cute. Lovely Jilly Cooper. Lovely late Dame Jilly Cooper . Riders, you know, we all read riders at school and Jillie Cooper's daughter, Emily was at school with me a couple of years younger. And the headmistress banned riders. And Jillie herself came to see the headmistress and said, You can't do that that because really affects my book sales. You want me to continue I know exactly sending my daughter here. You need to not do that. That is really boots on the ground promotion. Plot point question two. What word appears in the titles of both of the debut novels by the authors Richard Coles and Holly Jackson? That would be so murder monastery good. Murder. So murder . Murder is correct . Murder before Evans was actually Richold's book and a good girl's guide to murder. Yeah. Question three , the novel The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry was written by R achel Who? That is written by Rachel Joyce . Rachel Joyce is correct. So Joyce is your clue there . Question four, the author GK Chaserton, who wrote The Father Brown series of stories also wrote a detective novel called The Man Who Was What ? I have no idea. Absolutely no idea. The man Who was dead? Dead? Man who was dead. A man who was dead is strong. It's not right . And finally, question five and potential clue number five, known as the Poet of the Nile, the Egyptian poets who helped revive Arabic poetry during the late nineteenth century was Mohammed Hafez ? I don't know . I think I know what I think is because I'm trying to work back with it . What the characters in the book itself? Ibrahim. Yeah, let's say Ibrahim. Your answer is Ibrahim, that was very well worked out because that is the correct answer which is making me think you do know what the mystery book. So for a bonus three points, what do those clues? So correctly you've got Cooper, Murder , Joyce and Ibrahim. So Joyce and Ibrahim are both members of the Thursday Murder Club. By Richard Osman, exactly the best selling Thursday Murder Club is the correct answer there. The one answer that you missed that would have helped you was GK Chesterton wrote The Man Th Whuros Wasday , which features in the book's title. But everything else, you got right. So the Jillie Cooper answer in Rich Dosmond's novel The Retirement Village is called Cooper's Chase . Richard Coles wrote Murder before even song Holly Jackson wrote a good girl's guide to murder, so that connecting word is murder. The unlikely pilgrimage of Harold Fry was written by Rachel Joyce. Joyce is one of the main characters, as you said. Thursday was the clue that you missed, but you worked it out anyway, and the Egyptian poet was Mohammed Hafer's Ibrahim . Now things fall apart Angel and Shaneen, your first plot point question is what is the first name of Mark Twain's orphan character who lives with his aunt Polly and his half brother Sid in St. Petersburg, Missouri. Tom Sawyer or is it Huckleberry Finn? Oh good boy. I think it must be Tom Sawyer. That's gonna be Tom Sawyer. Yes, Tom Sawyer. Tom Sawyer from the Adventures of Tom Sawyer that, is correct. Question number two. The second novel in Margaret Atwood's Mad Adam trilogy is called The Year of the What? This is the Year of the Flood, isn't it? Yes, yes. Fl, Iud'dll find an answer. Your final answer is indeed correct. Question three, what surname is shared by the author of the nineteen ninety five novel The Horse Whisperer and the author of the twenty twenty five novel The Correspondent . Also became a film but I don't know the author. I can't think of a common zone and now I think we might have to pass on that one. Yes, we're going to pass. We don't even have a guess I'm afraid. Okay, don't worry, we'll come back to it. Question four, what is the first name of the British Secret Service agent who first appears as the central character in nineteen sixty one's Call for the Dead? nineteen sixty one, the Secret Service I was gonna say Jin could Taylor Soldier spot. That's what I was thinking. I don't know if it's name. No, I can't either. Is it Harry? We're gonna guess Harry . Harry, I'm afraid is incorrect . And question five , the fourth book in the children's novel series a series of unfortunate events by Lemony Snicket is called The Miserable What ? I read these with my children and I don't know, we got through them so fast I can't remember what they're miserable miserable. What are the do you know the others in the series? Off the top of my head afraid they were Tried to come with an educated guess miserable mile, the miserable m . I like miserable mouse. Yeah. We're going with mouse. Mouse, I'm afraid, is incorrect. So the two clues you've got from your correct answers are Tom and Flood Does that help you towards the bonus book title? Books about floods. There's the Bible. There's the Bible. Is any toms in the Bible? I'm big flood I can't with only two . I think I can't with only two. I do think it's tricky with only two. Just for fun, and given that Alex and Maya you were listening to all of those questions, you may have come up with the answers to the ones that might have that. Have you got yourselves towards the correspondent was written by Vaglener Evans we think George Smiley? Yeah, I think it's George Smiley and it's Miserable Mill. Okay , so you've got, therefore, Tom Flood , Evans , George , and Mill e. What would that lead you towards? I've written down Mill on the Floss. Oh my word, you're good . Well done, Alex. The Mill on the Floss by George Elliot is correct. Mark Twain's awf charoracingter is Tom , as you correctly said. The Margaret Atwood novel is The Year of the Flood. You were correct on that as well. The horse whisperer and the correspondent were written by Nicholas Evans, wrote the horse whisperer, and Virginia Evans wrote the correspondent and George Elliot's real name was Marianne Evans. Call for the dead is about George Smiley, as in George Elliot , and the name of the Lemony Snicket Book, as you said, was The Miserable Mill as in the Mill on the floss. So you would have got maximum points there as it happens. Angel and Shanine you have two points and Meyer and Alex you have seven . It's time for round two , the first of our specialist subject rounds, and we're going to start with Shanine Five Questions on your chosen book, which is the Secret Diary of Adrian Moll, aged thirteen and three quarters , a comic fictional diary of a nineteen eighties teenager who thinks he's a misunderstood intellectual. So Shiny, why did this appeal to you so much? I read it as a child I think when I was about ten or eleven so I think a lot of things probably went over my head at that point and then going back to it as I do every few years. I just like him as a character. He's a bit of a nerd, he's a bit tragic and I can relate to that even as I get older, even more so when I was younger, but you're finding layers, you're finding sort of hidden ? Yeah, he's very clueless about what's going on around him. I think it's really nicely written because you get this story developing, but you're not really sure where it's going. I've read it many times. And lots of people may not have read it as regularly as you do, but they will remember it from their childhood. So this will be fun. There's one point for a correct answer, but if you answer incorrectly, I will throw it over to your opponents and they can win two points if they know more about your specialist subject than you do. So question one , in the first diary entry, what alcoholic drink did Adrian's father get the dog drunk on? As a dog lover and a dog address that I would suggest never give your dog alcohol? I think it's Brandy. I will accept Brandy. Yes. If we added detail, it's cherry brandy, but Brandy is correct. Question two, who does Adrian have a brief affair with after being introduced at a meeting of the Pink Brigade. It's me. I can't remember. I'm gonna say Anne, but it's not right. It isn't Anne. I'm going to pass that over to Myra and Alex. Long time since I've read this. Unfortunately, I have never read it, which might be let's say share . It's actually Barbara, but specifically Barbara Boyer. And I assume Boyer is how I pronounce it not Boyer. I mean, it's a brief affair. I don't Question three, what is the name of Rick Lemmons baby daughter? Not sure. I think it's something that's probably wrong. They like Elsie? It isn't Elsie. Any idea from Alex and Meyer? Eleanor? I'm going to go with you . You would think you would think first of all it might be a name that you would associate with a little girl. Yeah. But no, the answer is Herod . Why do you think of little boys with that one they ? Well Question four , what date is Adrian's birthday? April second. Well done, Chenin, it is indeed april the second. And finally in this round, Question five , Adrian concludes he must be an intellectual after seeing who on TV and understanding nearly every word he says. Malcolm Muggerge. Malcolm Muggerge is correct. Well done, so out of a potential five points, Chanin, you got three . Now Maya, it's your turn and your special subject is Station eleven by Emily St. John Mandel, a hugely popular science fiction novel following a travelling acting troupe , navigating a post apocalyptic world . Why this book in particular? It sounds quite bleak , but I actually find I love a lot of dystopian fiction, but the thing I love about this book is actually how it portrays a future where the hope remains and the way that the humanity continues and they really hold on to art and community . It's a beautiful book and it's very lyrical and I can read it over and over again. I never get tired of it. It's also a funny one because it came out in twenty fifteen five years before COVID before COVID . So reading it before COVID and then reading it after COVID is two wildly different experiences and it's very rare that you can get that. You've definitely now persuaded me that I need to read station eleven. I have not done yet . Right, Question one, which of Shakespeare's tragedies is being performed in chapter one? That would be King Leah. King Lear is correct. Question two, what instrument is played by August in the traveling symphony? Oh, I think it's one of two. I think it's either a viola or a violin. I'm going to say violin. You went right. Well done, it is violin. Question three, where did the paperweight that Clark gifted Arthur and Miranda come from? Came from Rome. It did indeed come from Rome. Question four , what is the name of the deadly pandemic flu featured in the novel? It's the Georgia flu. It is indeed the Georgia Flu. Question five, what phrase does Kirsten have tattoo ed on her left forearm? Is it survival is insufficient? It is indeed survival is insufficient. That is very, very impressive because that is five out of five. Well done, Maya . So our overall scores currently stand at Angel and Chanine with five points, Maya and Alex with twelve . And there'll be more specialist subject questions after the next r ound. Now it's time for the long list. So I'm going to give both teams a category and you're going to bid against each other to see who can name the most correct answers . The category is completed novels of Charles Dickens and I can confirm that there are a maximum number here of fourteen titles. So forget about the mystery of Edwin Drud famously unfinished, and I'm also going to be a scrooge and not allow a Christmas carol because it's a novella. So there are three points if you can complete the highest bid and an extra three points if you can successfully identify the golden answer. And the clue for today's golden answer is that it is the first work of fiction to ever mention a d inosaur . I'm going to start with Angel and Shane as you're trailing at the moment. What is your bid Seven You've gone for seven . Alex and Meyer, are you going to top seven? I think we're stuck on seven, so no, I was useless at this, so this is all that like I'm afraid. Let's say eight . Oh, are you gonna write one? No come to me. One's going to come to me, I know. That's very bold. Would you like to raise on eight Absolutely no with a target of eight titles , Maya and Alex go. So we've got hard times. That's in the first answer. Number two. Tailor of two cities? Yep. Three. Nicholas Nickleby? Yep. Four. David Copperfield. Correct. Five. Bleak house. So bleak house is your fifth and that is also the golden answer. Well done . Six . Follow the twist. Correct . Number seven , the pickwick papers. The pickwick papers is correct. Now comes the moment of truth. What are you going for for number eight ? The old curiosity shop. And the old curiosity shop is correct. You have done it. Did you just come to you? Halfway through . That's jammy. Well done that was jammy. Well done, you got the eighths. You could also have had Barnaby Rudge, Dombey and Son, Great Expectations, which I would have thought would have really blame. Problem. Yeah . Little Dorrit , Martin Chusselt and our mutual friend , and that would have completed the list of fourteen. So congratulations, Maya and Alex, although I think mainly Alex Mainly Alex You've won three points and you've got three points for naming the golden answer, which was Bleak House , the first work of fiction to mention a dinosaur. And in the opening lines, Dickens notes It would not be wonderful to meet a megalosaurus forty feet long or so host unforgettable backyard barbecues with savings from Whole Foods Market. Get the good times going with Made in House chicken or pork sausages and ready to cook kebabs for hassle free flavor. Grab tasty flatbreads and their new balsamic chicken salad in the prepared foods department. Keep things fresh with organic red cherries, strawberries and peaches at their peak. And stock up on bugs spr ays and sun care must have . Make your summer sizzle at Whole Foods Market. Ever invest in something that seemed incredible at first, but didn't live up to the hype , like those five dollars roses at a gas station , or a second hand piece of technology that breaks in the first ten minutes . Marketers know that feeling. We optimize for the numbers that look great, impressions, reach and reacts , but when they don't show revenue , well, that's a not so great conversation with the CFO . LinkedIn has a word for that Bullspend Now you can invest in what looks good to your CFO. LinkedIn adds gener ates the highest roads of all major ad networks . You'll reach the right buyers because you can target by company, industry, job title, and more. So cut the bulls spend. Advertise on LinkedIn , the network that works for you . Spend two hundred and fifty dollars on your first campaign on LinkedIn ads and get a two hundred fifty credit for the next one. Just go to LinkedIn. com slash broadcast . That's linked in dot com slash broadcast. Terms and conditions apply . Waddling like an elephantine lizard up Hoban Hill. They'd only identified two dinosaurs, I think at the time that he was writing Bleak Has, but one of them was Megalosaurus. At the end of this ram, then while Maya and Alex, you are running away with it. Scoop lead with eighteen points, Angel and Shane, works still to be done. Five points . Time now for the second of our specialist subject rounds and angel, you have chosen Delia Smith's Christmas, the nineteen nineties classic festive cookbook, so tell us why. I'm an immigrant to the UK. I'm originally from America and our food culture, especially in the south where I'm from is very different . And also Christmas celebrations are very different. And so when I first came to this country, I thought, well, if I'm going to assimilate, I'd better learn how to do Christmas properly. So someone suggested to me that I should get Delia's Christmas and I did. And so I use it every year. Oh my word. And is bread sauce one of the great discoveries of your life? It is roast potatoes too. We didn't have roast potatoes when I was growing up. It was always mashed or french fries or something, but I'd never seen a roast potato until I came to this country. Here we go then on Delia Smith's Christmas Question One. The book includes an omelette recipe originally created for and named in honor of which English author who wrote Anna of the Five Towns . You know, I looked at this earlier when I was rereading the book in preparation and I thought, I'd better remember that name and it's gone completely out of my head. I cannot remember it. It's gone. So for a potential two points, Myer and Alex, do you know after whom that omelet was named? Five towns is like Stoke . So like Alan Bennett? Let's go for it. Is he from Stoke? O thatr is Arnold Bennett? Bennett, then push you for more. I mean, it's probably wrong, but would you say author though, Allan Bennett? Did you know you'd have been right if you'd gone with Arnold? It's Arnold Bennett. Yes. But I love that thought process. I went to Union in Stoke and I know it . That's so annoying . Question two, in the book, Delia writes that her Christmas Eve tradition is to bake to the backdrop of which BBC TV show. It must be something like stars in their eyes I have no idea. Okay, that's a good guess. I like it as a guess. It's not correct though. So coming over to Alex and Maya. It's Christmas Eve tradition. The book's been around for a while . Maybe something like Morcom es. Or top of the pops. Top of the pop. That feels like something that could be on the back. Let's say top of the pops. That's sort of more funky than actually the answer . I like the idea of away to the hits, but actually she's being reverential. It's the festival of nine lessons and Carols from King's College. Question three on page ninety two , Delia states that one of the greatest gifts from God is good what? Cheese? A corhre,ct , cheese. It is. I would have accepted cheese and bread, but cheese. Question four, in Delia's rundown of the last thirty six hours before Christmas lunch, what time does she serve lunch itself? I believe she serves it at one PM. One PM is not correct. I'm passing it over. I think Dea's gonna want to watch the Queen speak look . I think she's gonna watch and that's at three. Yeah. So do we say three hundred fifteen or is it before? That's a good point. Say half one. That gives you time to eat and then pop the turley on. You want to eat before the queen? She'd be hungry, yeah. It's been cooking for thirty six hours . Half one is good. Okay, we're going to say half one. Just a bit later actually. So two o'clock. I do that that seems very quick to eat and then watch the king speak. You have time? Question five, your final one on your specialist subject. Delia's recipe for Brussels sp routs includes bacon and which type of wine is it armagnac? It's not. Coming over to Alex and Maya. I don't eat Brussels sprouts, so I avoid those. I do drink wine, but it ruined me . Absolutely we'll say Madeira wine. That feels festive. It does. It feels festive. It's not right though. Riesling That's the answer. I don't remember that. No. Did you not do that? Maybe I drink'd all the reasling . This whole book is just a fuzz. That's the problem . And Delia Smith, what an incredibly successful author. She's sold over twenty one and a half million copies today to her date of cookery books and also has, I think, the rare accolade of being a noun, so the delia effect or doing a delia. It was included for the first time in the Collins English dictionary in two thousand one , because it's passed into everyday usage. Well, Angel, at the end of that round, I'm afraid it was only cheese. And that's got you one point . So time now for Alex. And you've chosen Tin Man by Sarah Winman, a rare case there of author's surname rhyming with the book title , which follows the friendship of Ellis and Michael as they get caught up in a tender love triangle with Annie. So why this book in particular? It's the first book I read of Sarah Women's and she went on to become one of my favourite authors. I love her writing but this book particularly it's a story of grief and sadness , but ultimately it's really quite uplifting and it's how you navigate through that and sort of the strong bonds of friendship and love and all of those sort of themes. It's just such a beautiful book. It is and it's stunningly well written and we're going to start with a question about the opening pages of the novel. Ellis's mother Dora wins a raffle and chooses as a prize a painting featuring which flowers That would be sunflowers Sunflowers is correct . Question two, what was Ellis delivering when he first met Annie He was taking Annie a Christmas tree. Christmas tree is right . Question three, Michael takes Annie to Covent Garden and buys her what outfit? Oh, that is when they are shopping for her wedding dress. Her wedding dress is correct. Three out of three so far. Two more questions to go. What song by the impressions was Michael dancing to when Annie first met him? I don't think I remember that one. No, I've gone blank on that. Okay, we're going to pass it over to Angel and Shane. I don't know. No, I haven't even got it. I think we'll have to pass on that. Yeah . People get ready. Is the answer. Final question , Michael's first article was about which famous actress and gay icon . That would be Gudy Garland. Judy Garland is correct. After that second specialist round Angel you have scored one point Alex you got four and that moves your team score Maya and Alex onto twenty two. Angel and Shane you have six right Right, Meyer and Alex, I think that's an unassailable lead, but we're going to come to a final round and this is anagrams. There are two different categories each with three anagrams and I'm going to throw in an extra clue to help you. You might not need it, you might buzz in ahead of that. But unjumble the letters correctly and you will win one point. So for example , the anagram might be Tanner's knife and the clue might be a gothic novel by Mary Shelley and you would go