The Ultimate Trivial Pursuit(r) Question & Answer Book

I bought this so that we can plan learning games while on the road. One of us asks the question and the other tries to answer. Good book.

Fun book! Good to use for small groups and retreats, which is what I wanted it for. We play a sort of trivial pursuit at our Quilt Retreats.

I like reading trivia books occasionally not just to test and improve my general knowledge, but also to stimulate and improve my memory. Digging for answers that are on the periphery of your memory is good for the old neuronal network. However, the most fun I get out of a book like The Ultimate Trivial Pursuit Question and Answer Book (hereafter referred to as TUTPQAB) is getting answers correctly to questions that I don't initially know the answers to. In other words, approaching some of these questions as puzzles instead of as just straight 'do you know it or not' questions. This is the advantage of encountering these questions at your leisure in book form instead being harassed and badgered by obnoxious, hidebound, ultra-competitive opponents as you would be if you were playing the actual Trivial Pursuit board game. (You know the type. He or she is supposed to be your best friend or your folksy, do-anything-for-you neighbour, but get them on the other side of a Trivial Pursuit board and they are ready to call a lawyer before they'll give you a slice of pie just because you've answered 'Santa Claus' instead of 'Father Christmas', or 'Fujiyama' instead of 'Mt. Fuji'. You can find better behaviour in wrestling pits or Boxing Day riots that in the typical Trivial Pursuit games I've been involved in.) At 864 pages TUTPQAB is a very generous book and nicely presented with good production values. There are six questions per page, with the answers on the flip side of the page -very uncluttered, very convenient, with no flipping to the back of the book to check answers. The book is divided into six chapters of the six traditional Trivial Pursuit categories -144 questions in each category. There are some errors: -P. 131, Q. 6 -'What capital city touches two continents?' -Answer: 'Istanbul' -Istanbul is not the capital of Turkey, Ankara is. -P. 161, Q. 2 -'What Peter Sellers Inspector Clouseau movie doesn't have Pink Panther in the title.' -Answer: 'The Wrong Box' -Wrong answer. The Wrong Box is not an Inspector Clouseau movie, although Peter Sellers does have a small, but hysterically funny part in it. The correct answer is A Shot In The Dark. -P. 663, Q. 4 -'What radioactive element was used in the Fat Boy bomb dropped on Nagasaki but not in the Little Boy dropped on Hiroshima?' -Answer: 'Plutonium' .Which is correct, but the bomb that dropped it was called Fat Man not Fat Boy. I know this might be getting picky, but we're talking about the world's only nuclear devices ever used on human beings and we really should get it right. Other quibbles: -The entertainment section is much too easy. An entertainment/junk culture know-nothing like me was able to answer/guess far too many questions. After a few pages obvious patterns emerged. The answers to most 'pop diva' questions were either 'Madonna' or 'Britney Spears'. Other unusually repetitive answers involved SpongeBob SquarePants, the Simpsons, Teletubbies, Spiderman, and the movie

This is a fun, partible trivia activity to use alone or with a group. If you're with family or friends and you don't want to drag out the Trivial Pursuit board, cards and pegs, you can just read the questions in the book and test each other's trivia knowledge. It's stimulating, educational and would be enjoyed by any trivia fan. It's portable, easy to use when traveling. Take a litle trivia break at work, in traffic jams or when socializing with friends. I highly recommend it. You can also use the questions in the book in conjunction with your Trivia game board if you like.