The Daily Quiz

Jonathan Franzen won a National Book Award for which novel about the joys and hurts of the Lambert family?

• The Corrections
• Freedom
• Purity
• The Twenty-Seventh City

North America's fastest land animal takes its name from the backward-curving projections on its head. What is it?

• The jackrabbit
• The pronghorn
• The mule deer
• The coyote

Which nine-letter verb means to sear flesh with a hot iron to close a wound?

• Sublimate
• Coagulate
• Cauterize
• Lacerate

James Dickey wrote which novel about a canoe trip gone horribly wrong, appearing in the film version as a sheriff?

• The Descent
• Wild River
• The Edge
• Deliverance

Chuuk, Kosrae, Pohnpei, and Yap are the four Federated States of which Pacific nation?

• Polynesia
• Melanesia
• Micronesia
• Palau

Founded in 1909, which British government agency collects and analyzes foreign intelligence?

• MI5
• Scotland Yard
• MI6
• GCHQ

David Bowie appears as inventor Nikola Tesla in which 2006 Christopher Nolan film about rival magicians?

• The Illusionist
• Insomnia
• The Prestige
• Memento

This deciduous conifer, unusual for shedding its needles each autumn, lends its name to the "bald" variety. What is it?

• The larch
• The redwood
• The hemlock
• The cypress

Which author poisoned an heiress in the West End in her 1945 novel "Sparkling Cyanide"?

• Agatha Christie
• Dorothy Sayers
• P.D. James
• Ngaio Marsh

In 1916, the Ottomans celebrated as Allied troops evacuated which peninsula after a failed attempt to seize Constantinople?

• Crimea
• The Balkans
• Sinai
• Gallipoli

After World War I, which country lost two-thirds of its territory under the Treaty of Trianon?

• Bulgaria
• Hungary
• Romania
• Poland

Southern Quebec's Plains of Abraham, site of a decisive 1759 battle, overlook which river?

• The Hudson
• The Ottawa
• The St. Lawrence
• The Richelieu

Which effect, named for an Austrian physicist, explains both a receding siren's falling pitch and cosmic red-shifting?

• The Coriolis effect
• The Venturi effect
• The Doppler effect
• The Faraday effect

This deep-fried New Orleans pastry, dusted with powdered sugar, takes its name from the French. What is it?

• A cruller
• A churro
• A fritter
• A beignet

Which early human species included Kenya's "Turkana Boy," dating to about 1.6 million years ago?

• Homo habilis
• Neanderthals
• Australopithecus
• Homo erectus