Non- Fiction Trivia

80+ Best Non- Fiction Trivia Questions & Answers

Mike Oberman

Updated: June 15th, 2023

Contents
Challenge your understanding of the real world with our collection of non-fiction trivia! From books to biographies, uncover fascinating facts and impress your friends with your vast knowledge.

Easy

Question: Who wrote a book of 'Inspiring Recipes for Meatless Meals'?

Answer: Linda McCartney

Question: Who wrote 'The Power of Positive Thinking' in 1953?

Answer: Norman Vincent Peale

Question: How many J. M. Coetzee books appear in '1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die'?

Answer: 10

Question: Who directed the film adaptation of 'Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption'?

Answer: Angelina Jolie

Question: Who wrote the book 'Complete Hip and Thigh Diet'?

Answer: Rosemary Conley

Question: Who wrote 'The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich'?

Answer: William L. Shirer

Question: In what year was Paula Deen's The Deen Family Cookbook first published?

Answer: 2009

Question: Which Norman Mailer book is based on a protest march?

Answer: The Armies of the Night

Question: Who wrote a best-selling science book called 'A Brief History of Time'?

Answer: Stephen Hawking

Question: Whose works include 'The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test' and 'The Right Stuff'?

Answer: Tom Wolfe

Question: Which scientist collaborated with Sigmund Freud to write the 1933 book 'Why War?'?

Answer: Albert Einstein

Question: Who was the former Beirut hostage who wrote 'An Evil Cradling'?

Answer: Brian Keenan

Question: Who wrote 'The Almagest', a mathematical and astronomical treatise on the apparent motions of the stars and planetary paths?

Answer: Ptolemy

Question: The book 'The Devil in the White City' features tales of which serial killer?

Answer: H. H. Holmes

Question: Who purchased the film rights to 'The Devil in the White City' in 2010?

Answer: Leonardo DiCaprio

Question: In what decade was the 'Oxford English Dictionary' first published?

Answer: 1920s

Question: Philosopher and writer Jeremy Bentham, 1748-1832, is associated with what school of thought?

Answer: Utilitarianism

Question: Who wrote the book 'Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption'?

Answer: Laura Hillenbrand

Question: Who wrote 'The Devil in the White City'?

Answer: Erik Larson

Question: In which city is the Bodleian library?

Answer: Oxford

Question: In what year was 'The Devil in the White City' originally published?

Answer: 2003

Question: What is the name of Andy McNab's 1993 book about a patrol behind enemy lines in Iraq?

Answer: Bravo Two Zero

Question: Rhonda Byrne wrote which best selling self help book in 2006?

Answer: The Secret

Question: Who co-authored 'The Communist Manifesto' with Karl Marx?

Answer: Friedrich Engels

Question: In what year was 'Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption' first published?

Answer: 2010

Question: Merriam-Webster is a name associated with which sort of books?

Answer: Dictionaries

Question: Who wrote 'The Pilgrims Progress'?

Answer: John Bunyan

Question: Who wrote the book 'In Search of Schrödinger's Cat'?

Answer: John Gribbin

Question: In what year was 'The Joy of Cooking' first published?

Answer: 1931

Question: Who collaborated with Maurice Joyant to write 'Art de Cuisine'?

Answer: Henri de Tolouse-Lautrec

Question: Which author wrote biographies about Princess Diana, Tom Cruise and Monica Lewinsky?

Answer: Andrew Morton

Question: The book 'The Devil in the White City' is set in which US city?

Answer: Chicago

Question: Who published the book 'Le Guide culinaire' in 1903?

Answer: August Escoffier

Medium

Question: The book 'Call the Midlife' is the biography of which BBC radio presenter?

Answer: Chris Evans

Question: The Lady In The Van' is the memoir of which playwright?

Answer: Alan Bennett

Question: Who wrote 'Into Thin Air', 'Into the Wild' and 'Under the Banner of Heaven'?

Answer: Jon Krakauer

Question: Which basketball legend titled his autobiography 'Driven from Within'?

Answer: Michael Jordan

Question: The first public library in America was opened in what year?

Answer: 1698

Question: Which internet CEO wrote the best selling book 'Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead'?

Answer: Sheryl Sandberg

Question: In what year was the first Los Angeles Times Cookbook published?

Answer: 1902

Question: Who wrote an 1861 'Book of Household Management'?

Answer: Isabella Beeton

Question: Which writer wrote a book about bullfighting entitled 'Death in the Afternoon'?

Answer: Ernest Hemingway

Question: In which decade did Guinness start to publish its book of Records annually?

Answer: 1960s

Question: Who wrote 'The Armies of the Night'?

Answer: Norman Mailer

Question: Who wrote 'The Fire Next Time' and 'Notes of a Native Son'?

Answer: James Baldwin

Question: Over 1 million copies have been sold of the motivational book 'Awaken The Giant Within', but who wrote it?

Answer: Anthony Robbins

Question: What is the title of John Bunyan's famous work?

Answer: Pilgrim's Progress

Question: In what year was Julia Child's second cookbook released?

Answer: 1968

Question: Who wrote the official biography of Apple founder Steve Jobs life?

Answer: Walter Isaacson

Question: In which year was the first vegetarian cookbook supposedly written?

Answer: 1812

Question: Whose 1896 'The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book' has stayed in print for over a century?

Answer: Fannie Farmer

Question: Which Russian wrote of 'War and Peace'?

Answer: Leo Tolstoy

Question: The title of the autobiography of which soccer player is titled 'Commitment'?

Answer: Didier Drogba

Question: Who wrote the book 'Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking'?

Answer: Susan Cain

Question: Who wrote 'The Female Eunuch'?

Answer: Germaine Greer

Question: How did Alfred Nobel initiate the Nobel Prize?

Answer: Requested in his will

Question: In what year was 'Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking' originally published?

Answer: 2012

Question: Which writer changed his name to distance himself from a relative in the Salem witch trials?

Answer: Nathaniel Hawthorne

Question: Which ancient civilisation wrote the oldest known cookbook on clay tablets?

Answer: Babylonians

Question: In what year was the Settlement Cookbook by Simon Kander published?

Answer: 1903

Question: The book 'The Devil in the White City' features tales of which architect?

Answer: Daniel Burnham

Question: The book '1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die' features an introduction from who?

Answer: Peter Ackroyd

Question: In which century did Muhammad Ibn Al-Hasan Al-Baghdadi write the 'Kitab al-Tabikh'?

Answer: 13th

Hard

Question: Who was the author of 'Das Kapital'?

Answer: Karl Marx

Question: Which politician published the memoirs entitled 'You Can't Say That'?

Answer: Ken Livingstone

Question: Who published essays on Self-Reliance, Love, Heroism, Character and Manners in 1841 and 1844?

Answer: Ralph Waldo Emerson

Question: Who wrote the motivational book 'How to Win Friends & Influence People'?

Answer: Dale Carnegie

Question: Who wrote 'The Prince', a famous work that redefined the beliefs of cynicism in the Italian Renaissance?

Answer: Niccolò Machiavelli

Question: Which London road is associated with book sellers?

Answer: Charing Cross Road

Question: Who released a 'Complete Cookery Course' in 1986 and an illustrated 'Complete Cookery Course' in 1989?

Answer: Delia Smith

Question: Whose non-fiction work includes 'Slouching Towards Bethlehem' and 'The White Album'?

Answer: Joan Didion

Question: Who was the author of the first known cookbook to be written by an American?

Answer: Amelia Simmons

Question: Who wrote the inspirational best selling book 'The Secret'?

Answer: Rhonda Byrne

Question: The Moosewood Cookbook by Mollie Katzen was written in what state?

Answer: New York

Question: Who wrote the book 'The Birds of America'?

Answer: John James Audubon

Question: The first public library in America was opened in what state?

Answer: South Carolina

Question: Who wrote the book 'The Audacity of Hope'?

Answer: Barack Obama

Question: Who wrote the 2010 cookbook 'Kitchen: Recipes from the Heart of the Home'?

Answer: Nigella Lawson

Question: Which MP has written a well-received biography of William Pitt the Younger?

Answer: William Hague

Question: Who left school at 16, studied cookbooks at the British Museum, and now has her own supermarket line of food?

Answer: Delia Smith