Q 01/05

In Roland Smith's novel Peak, teenager Peak Marcello tries to become the youngest person to summit which mountain?

A) Mount Kilimanjaro

B) Mount Everest

C) Annapurna

D) The Matterhorn

Answer · why

B) Mount Everest

Mount Everest is the goal because Peak's father, a famous climber, wants the publicity of guiding the youngest summiter ever. The trip begins as Peak'...

Q 02/05

In Roland Smith's Sasquatch, a retired biologist admits to being which real man who vanished over the Pacific Northwest?

A) D. B. Cooper

B) Jimmy Hoffa

C) Lord Lucan

D) Frank Morris

Answer · why

A) D. B. Cooper

D. B. Cooper is the old man's secret identity, and he says he hijacked the airliner to pay for his son's cancer treatment. The real hijacker parachute...

Q 03/05

Roland Smith's The Captain's Dog retells which American explorers' journey through the eyes of a dog named Seaman?

A) Peary and Henson

B) Frémont and Carson

C) Lewis and Clark

D) Byrd and Bennett

Answer · why

C) Lewis and Clark

Lewis and Clark crossed the continent with Seaman, a dog Meriwether Lewis bought for $20, half a month of an Army captain's pay. He was the only anima...

Q 04/05

Roland Smith's first book grew out of his work rescuing which animals after the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska?

A) Harbor seals

B) Bald eagles

C) Humpback whales

D) Sea otters

Answer · why

D) Sea otters

Sea otters soaked in crude oil were the patients, and Sea Otter Rescue became his first book. The tanker had struck Bligh Reef in Prince William Sound...

Q 05/05

Roland Smith notes that he shares a November 30 birthday with which favorite American author of his?

A) Walt Whitman

B) Mark Twain

C) Herman Melville

D) Edgar Allan Poe

Answer · why

B) Mark Twain

Mark Twain was born on November 30, 1835, exactly 116 years before Smith, who counts him among his favorite authors. Smith even records the minute of ...