I whispered "wow" at 7 and 10, both entranced and wishing I had read them sooner. Some mistakes were at the cusp but not quite! Humbling, confounding, and exhilarating at turns! Wonderfully challenging balanced quiz!!
1. Winnie the Pooh & Friends!!!! (Read first and Answered last! My EUREKA AHA! moment! Started from the bottom up and phone tapped away from bottom up copy and paste and repeat! And I stand by my guesses and misses, so i can learn and read more!
2. Fathers of the four Hobbits! (Ever since I found out Frodo's dad married the mother of all dragons!)
4. Reimagination of titular or central characters...
5. Bronte Sisters' Stories (how's that not a title?)
Well, one of the answers to your quiz this week was Twilight fanfiction and I’ve got a confession. I kinda like the Twilight books, well the first couple any way. In large part because they are Vampire: The Masquerade fanfiction. So you’ve got a fanfic of a fanfic.
I didn’t know any of that! If I had to read one set of books I’d choose Twilight over 50 Shades any day. I only know them through Mark Kermode’s angry reviews.
When I was the Program Director for a civic engagement non-profit, one of my interns was a HUGE Twilight fan so I read them to get a sense of what the hubbub was about. Very much gothic romance where the sex = death trope loomed large in the narrative. Later in the series that goes from symbolic to literal and that's when the series lost me.
I saw the Vampire: The Masquerade references immediately. It's a role playing game with a distinct feel and a very specific structure for Vampire society that reverberated through the series. It made me more forgiving of the books than many other people I've known.
8.5 - we seem to inhabit adjacent book spaces. Failed on 50 Shades which is porn for ladies? and I'm a gent. Got Tolkien but not specifically hobbit Daddies.
Very good! And yes I threw that one in for fun. I thought people might recognize the covers from constantly seeing them on sale in places like railway stations!
5/10. Annoyed and, dare I say, feeling like I may need to go eat some thistles that I didn't get 1. Delighted that I didn't get the one everyone is delighted not to have got 🤣, an 'almost but not quite' for 2 and 6, and a couple more my poor old brain just couldn't dredge up!
Very happy to have 'failed' no. 3, never read the book and don't intend to.
Surprised by no. 5 as I didn't know Gaskell had published North and South under male pseudonym (even though it's my favourite book of the five).
I'd never have got no. 7 in a million years.
What does it say about me that I didn't have a clue about Dante but got the hobbit dads and the Winnie-the-Pooh questions instantly? And I knew the Rosie M Banks and Hitch-hiker’s Guide link right away though I had to check the third one.
She published early stuff under a pseudonym but North & South is mid career (crucially, after Cranford) and I'd like to see a reference for it being published under anything other than Mrs Gaskell. Dickens made her change the name for serialisation - the original title was Margaret Hale - but that's not the same thing!
Ah whoops, that was my fault, Jon - I had meant to remove North and South as it was published anonymously rather than under her bizarre pseudonym 'Cotton Mather Mills' which she used for her short stories. I've corrected it now!
I've never read the 50 Shades books either and likewise never intend to. I always try to put one in that I would never have guessed myself!
Fair comment on both counts. The nearest I ever came to the 50 Shades books was listening to a discussion on Radio 4 (Open Book?) about them. If I'd ever had any interest in them it evaporated then.
Well-done quiz. Item 3 stumped me. I wasn't specific enough on item 4.
I am very mad at myself for not catching on to item 8. It's the most cleverly constructed question, I've done the assigned reading, and yet my memory let me down.
I will eat more fish (in honor of Jeeves and the dolphins) and try to do better next time.
I whispered "wow" at 7 and 10, both entranced and wishing I had read them sooner. Some mistakes were at the cusp but not quite! Humbling, confounding, and exhilarating at turns! Wonderfully challenging balanced quiz!!
1. Winnie the Pooh & Friends!!!! (Read first and Answered last! My EUREKA AHA! moment! Started from the bottom up and phone tapped away from bottom up copy and paste and repeat! And I stand by my guesses and misses, so i can learn and read more!
2. Fathers of the four Hobbits! (Ever since I found out Frodo's dad married the mother of all dragons!)
4. Reimagination of titular or central characters...
5. Bronte Sisters' Stories (how's that not a title?)
6. Revisionism of novels...?
8. absurdism?
9. Cathedrals!
6/10 if I take some liberties on the exact descriptions haha
It all counts!!
Well, one of the answers to your quiz this week was Twilight fanfiction and I’ve got a confession. I kinda like the Twilight books, well the first couple any way. In large part because they are Vampire: The Masquerade fanfiction. So you’ve got a fanfic of a fanfic.
I didn’t know any of that! If I had to read one set of books I’d choose Twilight over 50 Shades any day. I only know them through Mark Kermode’s angry reviews.
When I was the Program Director for a civic engagement non-profit, one of my interns was a HUGE Twilight fan so I read them to get a sense of what the hubbub was about. Very much gothic romance where the sex = death trope loomed large in the narrative. Later in the series that goes from symbolic to literal and that's when the series lost me.
I saw the Vampire: The Masquerade references immediately. It's a role playing game with a distinct feel and a very specific structure for Vampire society that reverberated through the series. It made me more forgiving of the books than many other people I've known.
6/10. Pretty happy with that!
Very respectable!
8.5 - we seem to inhabit adjacent book spaces. Failed on 50 Shades which is porn for ladies? and I'm a gent. Got Tolkien but not specifically hobbit Daddies.
Very good! And yes I threw that one in for fun. I thought people might recognize the covers from constantly seeing them on sale in places like railway stations!
5/10. Annoyed and, dare I say, feeling like I may need to go eat some thistles that I didn't get 1. Delighted that I didn't get the one everyone is delighted not to have got 🤣, an 'almost but not quite' for 2 and 6, and a couple more my poor old brain just couldn't dredge up!
7/10.
Very happy to have 'failed' no. 3, never read the book and don't intend to.
Surprised by no. 5 as I didn't know Gaskell had published North and South under male pseudonym (even though it's my favourite book of the five).
I'd never have got no. 7 in a million years.
What does it say about me that I didn't have a clue about Dante but got the hobbit dads and the Winnie-the-Pooh questions instantly? And I knew the Rosie M Banks and Hitch-hiker’s Guide link right away though I had to check the third one.
She published early stuff under a pseudonym but North & South is mid career (crucially, after Cranford) and I'd like to see a reference for it being published under anything other than Mrs Gaskell. Dickens made her change the name for serialisation - the original title was Margaret Hale - but that's not the same thing!
You're right, Shelly, it was originally published anonymously in a serial form. I had just forgotten to take it out of the list!
Thanks for clarifying - I thought I was going bonkers there for a moment 😂
Nope entirely me :)
It was an excellent / completely mad pseudonym though.
It’s so conspicuously fake!
Ah whoops, that was my fault, Jon - I had meant to remove North and South as it was published anonymously rather than under her bizarre pseudonym 'Cotton Mather Mills' which she used for her short stories. I've corrected it now!
I've never read the 50 Shades books either and likewise never intend to. I always try to put one in that I would never have guessed myself!
Fair comment on both counts. The nearest I ever came to the 50 Shades books was listening to a discussion on Radio 4 (Open Book?) about them. If I'd ever had any interest in them it evaporated then.
I think I once said I’d read the first one if I lost a bet!
Well-done quiz. Item 3 stumped me. I wasn't specific enough on item 4.
I am very mad at myself for not catching on to item 8. It's the most cleverly constructed question, I've done the assigned reading, and yet my memory let me down.
I will eat more fish (in honor of Jeeves and the dolphins) and try to do better next time.
I'm glad you enjoyed it, Joseph! I do try to trip people up so I thought I'd throw in the worst book series I could think of.