Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs [Paperback]

Ken Jennings (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 30, 2007

One day back in 2003, Ken Jennings and his college buddy Earl did what hundreds of thousands of people had done before: they auditioned for Jeopardy! Two years, 75 games, 2,642 correct answers, and over $2.5 million in winnings later, Ken Jennings emerged as trivia’s undisputed king. Brainiac traces his rise from anonymous computer programmer to nerd folk icon. But along the way, it also explores his newly conquered kingdom: the world of trivia itself.

Jennings had always been minutiae-mad, poring over almanacs and TV Guide listings at an age when most kids are still watching Elmo and putting beans up their nose. But trivia, he has found, is centuries older than his childhood obsession with it. Whisking us from the coffeehouses of seventeenth-century London to the Internet age, Jennings chronicles the ups and downs of the trivia fad: the quiz book explosion of the Jazz Age; the rise, fall, and rise again of TV quiz shows; the nostalgic campus trivia of the 1960s; and the 1980s, when Trivial Pursuit® again made it fashionable to be a know-it-all.
Jennings also investigates the shadowy demimonde of today’s trivia subculture, guiding us on a tour of trivia hotspots across America. He goes head-to-head with the blowhards and diehards of the college quiz-bowl circuit, the slightly soused faithful of the Boston pub trivia scene, and the raucous participants in the annual Q&A marathon in Stevens Point, Wisconsin, “The World’s Largest Trivia Contest.” And, of course, he takes us behind the scenes of his improbable 75-game run on Jeopardy!

But above all, Brainiac is a love letter to the useless fact. What marsupial has fingerprints that are indistinguishable from human ones?* What planet has a crater on it named after Laura Ingalls Wilder?** What comedian had the misfortune to be born with the name “Albert Einstein”?*** Jennings also ponders questions that are a little more philosophical: What separates trivia from meaningless facts? Is being good at trivia a mark of intelligence? And is trivia just a waste of time, or does it serve some not-so-trivial purpose after all?

Uproarious, silly, engaging, and erudite, this book is an irresistible celebration of nostalgia, curiosity, and nerdy obsession–in a word, trivia.

* The koala
** Venus
*** Albert Brooks


From the Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Did you know that Trivia was a Roman name for the goddess Hecate or that Jeopardy! tapes a week's worth of shows in a single afternoon? Jennings's record-setting 2004 six-month stint on the syndicated TV quiz show won him $2.5 million and instant fame as he landed on Letterman, Leno, Sesame Street and Barbara Walters's "Ten Most Fascinating People" list. Sprinkling trivia questions throughout his first book, the former computer programmer is a charmingly self-deprecating guide to the subculture of esoterica as he relates how he answered his first trivia question about the Wright brothers at four and made his chops on the ego-driven college quiz bowl circuit; confides how he mastered the "tricky" Jeopardy! buzzers; bonds with professional trivia writers; and describes being bested by the puzzler "Most of this firm's seven thousand seasonal white-collar employees work only four months a year" (Jennings answered FedEx; H&R Block is correct). You don't have to be a couch potato to answer this: what's an eight-letter word for a highly entertaining, fast-paced read that demystifies "America's most popular and most difficult quiz show" while pondering how trivia is a cultural phenomenon that offers a tidy alternative to life's messiness as well as instant camaraderie between people from different walks of life? (Sept. 12)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

Although reality shows and other mindless drivel seem to dominate the TV landscape, it's reassuring that Jeopardy! still remains as a last vestige of academic pursuit in a sea of pop culture. This book provides a behind-the-scenes look at this holy grail of trivia contests.Jennings, perhaps the most famous Jeopardy! winner of all, completed a record 74-game winning streak over a six-month period in 2004, shortly after the five-game limit was lifted. Steeped in the world of trivia, he offers an in-depth history of the young sport, with its roots in English pub contests, the quiz shows (and accompanying scandals) of the 1950s, and the collegiate quiz-bowl circuit, where nerds reign supreme. Jennings informs and astounds us and manages to cram in enough fun facts to keep any trivia nut happy. David Siegfried
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Villard (October 30, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0812974999
• ISBN-13: 978-0812974997
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.6 x 8.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (52 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #66,455 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #63 in Books > Education & Reference > Fun Facts > Trivia

More About the Author

Ken Jennings was born in 1974 just outside Seattle, Washington, but grew up overseas. His family spent fifteen years in Korea and Singapore, where his father worked as an attorney. His only lifeline to American pop culture during those years was TV on the Armed Forces Network, where he watched Jeopardy! religiously after school every afternoon.

He moved back to the States to attend the University of Washington for a year, and after putting school on hold for a two-year Mormon mission in Madrid, Spain, transferred to Brigham Young University in 1996. At BYU, he double-majored in English and computer science, and graduated in 2000 alongside his then-fianc'e Mindy Boam, whom he married that fall.

While at BYU, Ken captained the university's academic competition team, which consistently finished in the top ten at national quiz bowl tournaments. Since graduating, he has worked writing and editing questions for National Academic Quiz Tournaments, a company that organizes quiz competitions attended by hundreds of colleges and thousands of high schools nationwide. Ken also began to notice a parade of his friends and acquaintances from the world of quiz bowl appearing on game shows like Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, where many were able to pay off their student loans and buy flashy sports cars. With this in mind, Ken began to revive his childhood dream of appearing on Jeopardy!

Ken was working as a software engineer for a Salt Lake City health care staffing company in 2004 when he got the phone call telling him that his contestant audition had been successful and he would appear on a June game of Jeopardy! He spent a month making flash cards and cramming on familiar Jeopardy! subjects like U.S. Presidents, world capitals, and "potent potables" (Ken is a teetotaler).

Much to his surprise, Ken's Jeopardy! appearance extended beyond a single game in June: he took advantage of a recent rule change allowing Jeopardy! champs to appear on the show indefinitely, and spent the next six months hogging America's TV screens. Before losing on the November 30 show because he didn't know enough trivia about H&R Block, Ken won 74 games and $2.52 million, both American game show records.

The streak made Ken Jennings a 2004 TV folk hero, and he appeared as a guest on shows from The Tonight Show and The Late Show with David Letterman to Live with Regis and Kelly and Sesame Street. Barbara Walters named him one of the ten most fascinating people of the year. The Christian Science Monitor called him "the king of Trivia Nation" and Slate magazine dubbed him "the Michael Jordan of trivia, the Seabiscuit of geekdom." ESPN: The Magazine called him "smarmy (and) punchable," with "the personality of a hall monitor," thus continuing America's long national struggle between jocks and nerds.

Following his Jeopardy! streak, Ken's product endorsements have included FedEx, Microsoft Encarta, Allstate, Cingular, and even his onetime nemesis H&R Block. He speaks about the importance of learning at college campuses and corporate events, and has co-invented two trivia games: the Can You Beat Ken? board game from University Games, and Quizzology, a CD trivia game from Major Games. September 2006 will see the Random House release of Brainiac, Ken's book about his bizarre Jeopardy! adventures and about the phenomenon of trivia in American culture.

Ken currently lives outside Seattle, Washington, with his wife Mindy, his three-year-old son Dylan, and a deeply unstable Labrador retriever named Banjo. For more information, visit www.ken-jennings.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Freakin' Funny!, September 13, 2006

By 

Shocked...Shocked! (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs (Hardcover)

Loved this book way past expectations. Ken Jennings is slyly hilarious, as he takes us on the bizarre roller coaster that was his experience on Jeopardy!. Okay, trivial question: should I have put that period after that Jeopardy!-specific exclamation point? Because it looks funny to me. Ken Jennings would probably know. In this terrific, breezy book, he pulls together tons of intense, detailed trivia about trivia itself - and makes it cool. He's obviously writing about stuff he loves, and makes us see his world and imagine living in it - even for those of us lacking clue one about college quiz bowls, game show history or the difficult art of board game question writing. This is a smart, smart guy who comes across as nearly egoless as possible for someone this interesting, funny and insightful. It was entertaining to get Ken's (usually irreverent) take on his fellow brainiacs, Jeopardy!, Trebek, pop culture and, heck, life as we know it. I laughed aloud too many times to count. Don't be a dork, my nerdy friend - buy the book, settle in and prepare to snort milk out your nose. Enjoy.

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Trivia... This is your life, September 20, 2006

By 

Scott Green (Champaign, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs (Hardcover)

First off, this book isn't the fluffy memoir that might be expected of a pop culture 15-minuter. It's not an extensive autobiography or a ghostwritten rehash of the exact experience Ken went through in front of a national audience.

And while this is good - no matter how nice a guy Ken seems, 200+ pages about his life may not be a great page-turning experience - Brainiac seems a little light on Ken's "Jeopardy!" run, almost giving it passing mention and completely neglecting his (admittedly non-memorable) appearance in the show's Ultimate Tournament of Champions.

This is too bad, since putting a picture of Ken behind a podium on the front cover with the tagline "The greatest champion in 'Jeopardy!' history" implies more Trebek-related material.

That said, I really liked Brainiac. Ken clearly can write - at no point during the book would I have suspected it was a first attempt by a recent computer programmer. His prose is easy to read and not overly cerebral. He explores all the nooks and crannies of a subject, trivia, that is dedicated to the exploration of nooks and crannies. He spends time with a college quiz bowl team, visits a giant city-wide trivia contest, and meets with the authors of storied trivia books. Sometimes these experiences make the book move slowly, like an extended history of NTN bar trivia bookended by a visit to a pub quiz game in Massachusetts. But Brainiac is fun, unique, and well-put together.

Ken also ingeniously baked ten trivia questions into each chapter, using superscript numbers to identify the clues. A large number of these questions are substantially harder than the material on "Jeopardy!", but it's a clever concept that overall serves the book well.

There is, however, one caveat to my endorsement of this book. As the President of a major college quiz bowl team, I have a natural nerdy interest in trivia and matters trivial. My one thought throughout the book was, "I wonder who, outside the trivia circuit, could really read and enjoy this book." But, as Ken points out, almost all Americans are involved in trivia in some format, so maybe this niche book actually has a target market of everybody.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great read even if you don't watch Jeopardy!, September 14, 2006

By 

Sciwriter - See all my reviews

This review is from: Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs (Hardcover)

Ken Jennings isn't just a nerd who answered 74 games' worth of Jeopardy! questions. He's an erudite, witty, conversational, easy-to-read writer.
This is a wonderful book! Ken explores the history of trivia and all its modern-day manifestations. He also takes us to meet people who write trivia books, compete in high-stakes trivia competitions that make Jeopardy! seem simple, and in general, revel in the pursuit of the neat nugget of fact. Interspersed through the book are chapters telling the story of Ken's Jeopardy! journey. Ken also offers a lot of insight into why "trivia" isn't trivial at all.

I don't think this will be Ken's only book because he's such a good writer and has such curiosity about so many things. I'm looking forward to the next one.