We’re now moving onto our second competition of the day (or first for Saturday), which is our Literary Quiz. I’m very excited about this one as it gives me a chance to introduce some of my talented author friends who have kindly offered to contribute signed copies of their books as prizes.

We still have two more competitions to go, which are our General Knowledge Quiz later this afternoon, with a £25 gift voucher for the winner, and the SLUR Big Prize Quiz this evening. The winner of the SLUR Big Prize Quiz gets a £50 gift voucher and a signed print copy of SLUR plus my two parenting books. (Please note that some of these quizzes will be re-run on Saturday 20th September but times will differ. You can find full details of approximate times for both days at: https://dianewriting.wordpress.com/2014/09/02/launch-party-agenda/.)

But first let me tell you more about our Literary Quiz. We’re giving away a great prize for this one so there’ll be 20 questions but you have until 5pm next Tuesday 23^rd September to send your answers by email to: dianewriting@gmail.com. The winner will be drawn from all those with 20 correct answers or, if nobody gets all the answers right, the winner will be drawn from all those with the most correct answers. The winner will be contacted shortly afterwards, as soon as we have had a chance to go through all the entries, and will also be announced on the blog. We will also publish the answers on the blog after the competition closing date.

The Prize

I have taken my book launch day as an opportunity to introduce you to the wealth of talent that the independent publishing world has to offer. The prize will be a bundle of five signed print copies of books by talented authors. I have specifically chosen these five authors because I have read books by each of them and I personally recommend them. That’s why I’ve called them my Fab Five. I appreciate that everybody has different tastes in reading matter so I’ve selected a variety of genres. Here they are:

My Fab Five

Each of the following books are included in the prize for this competition. I have read every one of them and they’re all excellent. N.B. Please click on the author name to find out more about the author. By clicking on the book title you will be directed to the Amazon page for that book. If you’re not lucky enough to win the prize, why not take the chance to discover a new talent and buy one of these books from Amazon?

Author	Book	Genre
Joanne Phillips	Can’t Live Without	Romantic Comedy
Rose Edmunds	Never Say Sorry	Thriller
Guy Portman	Necropolis	Black Comedy
Clare Davidson	Reaper’s Rhythm	YA Urban Fantasy
Georgia Rose	A Single Step	Romantic Suspense

The Importance of Reviews

Independent publishing is currently undergoing a bit of a revolution. Because of the difficulties in getting published by mainstream publishers and the stringent rules they apply, increasing numbers of authors are publishing independently. This includes authors that previously had publishing deals, because they prefer to have control over when and how they publish, what design goes on the cover of their book, how they divide their time between writing and promotion etc.

However, the downside of independent publishing is that independent authors do not have the big advertising budgets of large publishing houses and we therefore rely on recommendations and word of mouth. Every time a positive review is published on Amazon or Goodreads it encourages potential readers to purchase our books. If you have read and enjoyed a book, please spare a couple of minutes to leave a review as the authors really appreciate your contribution.

Before I print the questions, let me remind you that we’ll be announcing the winner of our Meet the Author quiz shortly (Friday only). If you aren’t lucky enough to win a copy of SLUR, don’t forget that you can still buy one for as little as £1.99 for a Kindle version or £7.99 for a print version from Amazon at: http://viewbook.at/Slur.

The Questions

1. In “Tess of the d’Urbervilles” by Thomas Hardy, what was the name of the family horse that died?

2. In “Of Mice and Men” by John Steinbeck”, what is the name of the boss’s son on the ranch?

3. In the play “An Inspector Calls” by J. B Priestley, who does Sheila get engaged to?

4. In “The Hunger Games” by Suzanne Collins, what district are Katniss and Peeta from?

5. In the Shakespeare play Hamlet, what is the name of Hamlet’s mother?

6. In “The Lord of the Flies”, by William Golding, what was the conch used for?

7. What is the name of the magician in J. B. Priestley’s “Lost Empires”?

8. What is the name of the royal poisoner in “I Claudius” by Robert Graves?

9. Name the two cities in “A Tale of Two Cities” by Charles Dickens?

10. What condition does Terry Pratchett suffer from?

11. In the well-known satire “Animal Farm” by George Orwell, what was the novel said to parody?

12. The well-known writing duo Nicci French is the name of a man and wife team. What are their full names?

13. Val McDermid recently did a re-imagining of a Jane Austen classic as part of the Jane Austen project. What was the name of the book?

14. In “Jane Eyre” by Charlotte Bronte, what is the name of Mr Rochester’s dog?

15. Where was Robert Harris’s book “Enigma” based?

16. In Robert Bolt’s novel “The Mission”, what did the slave trader do that caused him to become a priest?

17. Who won the 2013 Man Booker Prize for Fiction and what was the name of the book?

18. Who is the bestselling author of all time?

19. What is the name of the warship that saves the narrator’s brother in H G Wells’ “War of the Worlds”?

20. What classic of Latin literature did Julius Caesar write?

——————–

Don’t forget to send your answers by email to dianewriting@gmail.com by 5pm on Tuesday 23^rd September.

——————–