Quiz Show Books

If you think you know EVERYTHING about the best show on television, you're wrong. These guys pull up obscure info and quiz you on it, drawing not only from the episodes but from interviews, books, and magazines. This is a great book and a must for an X-Phile's library! My only complaint: after reading Phil Farrand's lighthearted Nitpicker's Guide, the authors of this book seem really critical. I mean, what's up with their review of "War of the Coprophages"? Lighten up! Other than that, of course, diehard fans will cherish this book.

It seems everybody is doing an episode guide, but this book is different...it is all trivia, behind-the-scenes, and nitpicking. Loads of fun if THE X-FILES is your weekly fix. My son and I used it as a game to keep us occupied on a flight from NYC to San Diego as we tested each other's knowledge of our favorite TV show. I highly recommend this book...Must reading for X-Philes

Over 1,000 questions from the first three (3) seasons of my favorite TV show in a challenging format to test the gray cells of my brain. How would I describe this book: An X-Files version of JEOPARDY! More than just something to read...a book to play and damn well worth the $$$. I highly recommend it to any die-hard X-Phile

I've always considered myself an X-pert. None of my online friends (or real life for that matter) has ever been able to stump me on X-Files trivia. I'm completely addicted to the show and have 15 books.

This one is definately one of the best, pointing out many of the nitpicks and netpicks we've philes have already discovered in addition to new ones that sent me back to look for them. The trivia is extremely difficult and interesting.

I recommend this book to all philes who think they know it all. Take a few months to memorize this book and then you will know it all.

My brother got me this book for my birthday two years ago. It is my bible and my life (kind of sad, actually!) Anyways, it's really good and like that other guy said, if you take a few months to memorize it, you'll the X-Files Genius and you can impress your friends with little tidbits of knowledge. For example, what's Scully's home phone number? I'm not telling.. get it and look it up yourself! Note: good book for diehard fans!

I ordered this book because I think maybe I could get on a game show and win a lot of money. It has great information about "Millionaire", "Greed", "Hollywood Squares", "Jeopardy", "Twenty One", "Wheel of Fortune", "Win Ben Stein's Money", and "The $64,000 Question". It is a pretty book with lots of pictures, and it is very well edited.

But the best thing about the book is the 37 sets of "Millionaire"-style trivia questions. My family has had a blast taking turns being in the "Hot Seat", trying to making it to $1,000,000! These questions are Great! They are right on target with the kinds of questions that you actually watch on the show. Plus, they are very funny with some of the absurd answers that are given as possible choices. I definitely give this little book a "thumbs up" and say order this fun treat for your family.

My husband, Michael Dupee, and myself co-authored this book 5 years ago, and now we really could be TV Game Show Millionaires by following our own advice -- found in this book. My husband, Michael Dupee, is participating in the Jeopardy Ultimate Tournament of Champions which has a top prize of $2,000,000. What's more, by quizzing my husband at home to help him prepare to compete on the show, I have become really good at the trivia needed to win on Jeopardy, so maybe I will audition to go on Jeopardy after Michael completes his current tournament. Who knows? Maybe I can have a 75-game winning streak and win $2.5 million like Ken Jennings did.

I picked up this book at a book fair more for the trivia practise questions than because I had any aspirations to be on a game show. On a whim, I took the book to cafeteria duty during my job as an elementary school teacher and at the end of the lunch period, began to ask the kids questions from the book. It set the tone for the days to follow - the kids would ask when I arrived if I had "The Game Show Book" - if I did, they ate quickly and focussed on me when we organized our own after-lunch game show. Because the questions are arranged from easy to hard, it was easy to quite difficult, making it easy to adjust them to the grades that were present. The more difficult questions were quite difficult; of the 37 practise games in the book, I only got all the way to the hardest questions myself once.

Not all of the Quiz shows referred to in the book are still on, but the questions and tips given - which letters are the best to pick for "Wheel of Fortune," for example - make it a very worthwhile book.

Especially great for show business trivia buffs. You'd have to be an exceptional master to know all these answers already!

Samples: "Who did Nathan Birnbaum [real name] team up with for many years on stage and off?" "In 'It Came From Beneath the Sea,' what was 'It'? "What was the full name of Jack Benny's valet?"

Questions and answers for TV, music, movies, actors and actresses ...

"What was odd about the cartoon space-adventure series Clutch Cargo?"

Very entertaining, challenging, informative, and highly recommended!

Oh, this is amazing! A lot of good stuff from John Carpenter. I know the questions are SOOO hard that your brain is about to short-circuit! It should be a lot of fun!

ABOUT THIS BOOK
In the words of its author, Stanley Newman Presents Quiz Show is a book of "one-player trivia games specially designed for quiz show fans." The 18 original, general-knowledge games provide everything the "do-it-yourselfer" needs:

·Three games each of six completely different types
·Games created specifically to test your knowledge, assess your composure, and gauge your luck
·Imaginary opponents with distinct personalities and areas of expertise
·Precise instructions, examples, and scoring rules

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
David Fialkoff is a bona fide trivia buff. He's been a contestant on Who Wants to be a Millionaire? and Jeopardy! and he produced, wrote, and cohosted Local Quizine, a quiz show that ran for several years on his local public access TV station. His game show-inspired trivia quizzes often appear in Games magazine.

Ken Jenning's writes as if he is talking with you. He is humble, modest, and yet you know, how bright he really is. His conversational style of writing reminds me of Stephen King. Even Ken's (and Stephen's) forewords and afterwords are interesting and fun to read. I was fascinated by the inside information Ken provided about Jeopardy and his incredible run as champion on the show. That was probably the best part of the book for me. He went into great detail about a huge radio trivia contest held in Wisconsin (I believe) every year. That was somewhat interesting, but I didn't really need quite as much detail as he provided. I, myself, participate in the interactive Buzztime trivia game which is available at many bars throughout the country. Ken gave a brief mention of some of those afficianados of the bar trivia game, but personally I thought he could have spent more time on that. These are people who play trivia year-round, competing with other people throughout the country, sometimes individually, sometimes on teams. They don't just spend one weekend a year doing it. I have since discovered Ken's blog, where he writes almost daily. It is great reading. He is a fascinating, multi-faceted individual, much more than the quiet un-assuming trivia-geek you might assume he is. I would recommend this book highly to anyone who is a Jeopardy or trivia fan.

It is a nice read. Lighthearted and really cool to have the little trivia inserted within the body of the text. I very much liked the way it was written and enjoyed it very much.

Let's face it: Ken Jennings is a trivia genius, a god of sorts (like Apollo, but not Zeus, a.k.a. Brad Rutter). What surprised me is that Ken is also an excellent writer. He weaves an engrossing tale of childhood gameshow fascination and information obsession that develops into a vehicle for fame and fortune. Yet Ken's modesty about his abilities suggests to me that he hasn't been changed much, if at all, by his successes.

Note that Brainiac is more of a history of trivia competitions and America's preoccupation with quizzes than it is the endeavors of a single Jeopardy champion. Ken's own efforts are indeed detailed throughout the book, but that story is embedded in a larger tapestry that shows the blooming of trivia-related activities over the decades. The humor and interspersed trivia questions make this book one of my very favorites I've read in a while. Be sure to read this one, folks!

Ken is just hilarious, which is something you might not have gotten from his appearances on Jeopardy! His book is well written and fun to read, and his self-depreciating style makes him the world's most adorable nerd!

Trivia from the past to the present wrapped into an engaging story of one man's extroardinary run on Jeopardy. You even get to answer trivia questions along the way.

Light and entertaining.

I picked this book up on a whim from the library 2 days ago and did not put it down till I was done.

The 18-y-o protagonist, Ram Mohammad Thomas, has just won India's "Who Will Win A Billion?" by answering perfectly 12 questions. However, he is an uneducated impoverished waiter who doesn't know many common knowledge questions, so the judges are sure he has cheated and are beating him at the poice station when Smita, a lady lawyer, comes to hear his side and prove he is legitimate.

It just so happens that each of the questions related somehow to a story in Ram's life, and he relates each one, full of poverty, abuse, child labor, brushes with film stars, diplomats and the clergy, to show how he could know each answer.

Through it all, we meet a clever resourceful boy who never lets down his friends, such as Salim, his fellow orphan who wants to be a movie star, no matter what obstacles he faces. We are sure he is telling the truth about not cheating, but have no way of knowing how he did it until the very end.

I highly recommend this book, and am in fact buying it as a gift for several other people.

Easy to read, and lets you opportunity to participate in investigation by trying to gess outcome.
Gives some overview of reality in India.

In his debut novel, Vikas Swarup, an Indian diplomat, tells about life in modern India from the viewpoint of an orphan who changes several places of residence and jobs during his teen years.

The story is not told in a conventional way, however. The presentation is very original - in the beginning we find out that Ram Muhammad Thomas was arrested after having won the biggest television Q & A show in India (and the world), winning 1 billion rupees (24 million US dollars, by today's rate). He was arrested because being just a poor 18-year old orphan working as a waiter who won a difficult quiz show, the show organizers suspected he was cheating.

However, and this is how the plot unfolds, Ram wasn't cheating. Rather, by a sheer coincidence, all the questions touched on topics he knew about from discrete incidents in the past few years of his life. As he sits in the police department with a lawyer, he tells her about each episode, after which they see the recording of the relevant question of the show.

If the original way of presentation was the only good thing about the book, it would only be average. However, the book also provides an exciting and fascinating glimpse into the life in modern India. Well written and full of both common day-life and historical facts about the densely populated peninsula, it is both pleasant to read and provides lots of interesting information. Recommended.

Q & A is a very entertaining book on many levels. The view of Indian culture, the inclusion of crimes against humanity we see around the world, and the organizational structure of the novel itself create a fascinating story. You cannot help rooting for the underdog, even with his flaws.

There are a billion people in India, and one wins a billion rupees on "Who Will Win a Billion?", truly a one-in-a-billion shot. The one who wins is asked the only questions he could probably answer in the world, by a coincidence equivalent to his odds. From this timely and gripping premise, Vikas Swarup has crafted a wonderful novel, taking Ram Mohammed Thomas through his entire life in the way he explains how he, a poor 18-year old waiter, was able to answer each of the questions that led to his billion, and also to a stint in a Mumbai jail.

The book unfolds in the order of the questions Ram was asked on the quiz show, with his explanation of how he learned each answer forming the story. The most poignant part covers his period of time in Agra, where he works as a tourist guide at the Taj Mahal, befriends a boy who speaks nonsense, falls in love with a girl forced into prostitution and suddenly realizes that he must get on this quiz show to effect his life's destiny. I cried as that chapter ended.

Swarup is not a polished writer (he's a lawyer turned novelist) and he didn't experience many of the places or events of this book (he is well-educated and lives in England). But the book was clearly written with passion and compassion and a great deal of understanding and love for India and for his characters. His use of coincidence sometimes comes off as heavy-handed, until you realize that the entire story is about that one in a billion chance. Somewhere in heaven, Douglas Adams, inventor of the infinite improbability drive, is smiling reading this book.

It's A Great Book W/fINE Oldwords. For JEOPARDY! FANS,this book Is great!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love JEOPARDY all the time









Kevron Harris

This book is a must read for true Jeopardy fans. For those of us with a fascination in the show, or for anyone who wants a glimpse behind the scenes, you should really enjoy this book. Great book!

A story of an illegal contestant,Barbara Lowe, who got on the show under False pretenses and a fake name But Managed to win $50,000. -Kevron A.Harris

This book gives a closer look at America's favorite TV quiz show, Jeopardy! The book is written by former editorial associate producer, Harry Eisenberg. He tells about the staff and what happens through the year. It tells staff members coming and going and finally ends with Harry Eisenberg leaving the show. It is not surprising that this show is so successful. The staff supports the show and makes sure that mistakes don't happen. It also talks about the show changing throughout the years. Since the book was written in 1995, the book may not be as accurate because the show as undergone many changes since.

I've seen the show. I've played along. I've won. I've lost. But never for money.

Eisenberg's book helps me feel like I've been there. The thrill of creation. The inside stories of Alex Trebek and Merv Griffin. All the excitement of show business behind the scenes, written with clarity and plenty of fun.

Jeopardy's not what it seems. Thanks to Eisenberg for showing us the best and worst of this great TV institution.

"WHAT'S YOUR GAY & LESBIAN ENTERTAINMENT I.Q.? will tax readers' trivia knowledge to the utmost while it amuses and informs. ... Even the most learned of gay trivia buffs are certain to exclaim, 'I didn't know that!' to some of the brainteasers that Karvoski poses. He hasn't made things easy, but that's half the fun of the book." -- J.S. Hall, DALLAS VOICE

"Karvoski's a hoot and so is his book. Check it out." -- Archie Rothman, 4-FRONT MAGAZINE (Los Angeles)

"You can't spend ALL your time seeing movies, renting videos and watching television -- sometimes you'd rather read about them. ... WHAT'S YOUR GAY & LESBIAN ENTERTAINMENT I.Q.? [is] great for long drives, poolside or the beach." -- Belissa Cohen, IN LOS ANGELES

"In WHAT'S YOUR GAY & LESBIAN ENTERTAINMENT I.Q.?, Karvoski pretty much covers it all: queer film quotes, drama queens, video trivia, movie kisses, and who done what with whom and where in what medium. This is the kind of book you just HAVE TO OWN, not only to wow your friends with your Hollywood knowledge, but as a great resource when pondering all those baffling questions like, 'Was so-and-so REALLY queer?' And, 'Who DID so-and-so kiss in that movie, and what was the name of it again?'" -- Andrea L.T. Peterson, UPDATE

After my husband and I used the "SAT" to quiz each other about the show, we put it in our guest bathroom. Needless to say, many of our friends have enjoyed the book, as well. I wish Beth Golub would write a follow-up, since this book was published before the show ended.

This book has great trivia for your party games. I have used it at home and at work. I only wish there was an updated version with trivia past the 1994 episodes. For example, one of the questions asks "what is Kramer's first name"? The book's answer is "unknown", but we all know it is "Cosmo".

This trivia book on "Seinfeld's" first four seasons is a lot of fun, but don't count on an updated edition anytime soon: Castle Rock Entertainment, which produced "Seinfeld," put the kibosh on the book five years ago when they won a copyright infringement lawsuit against the publsher.

All unsold copies were ordered destroyed, which is why "The Seinfeld Aptitude Test" now commands almost 10 times its original selling price.