Never mind kiddie lit and Young Adult Fiction. Grownup literature is populated with fictional babies, children, toddlers. How much do you know about these literary rugrats?

1. What Martian chronicler gave us a truly evil baby? (And you thought this quiz was going to be easy.)

2. What gloomy New Englander wrote about a preternaturally wise child who seemed to know its own father?

3. What British author invents a child writer whose misunderstanding of sex leads to tragedy for others?

4. What immortal short-story writer tells about a kid so evil the kidnappers pay to give him back?

5. Not all fictional children are evil. (Just most of them.) What horror writer managed to come up with a clairvoyant kid who shines on?

6. What writer's heroine, Montana Wildhack, delights aliens by giving birth?

7. What African writer sends a five-year-old boy into the bush of ghosts?

8. What Aussie writer's novel has the youngest narrator ever?

9. You have to get two names for this one. What author and his composer buddy wrote an opera where the kid is threatened with being thrown off a cliff? (Extra credit: Why is this educational?)

10. What novelist endowed all the children born at midnight, 15 August, 1947, with magical powers, and why?

As usual, click on the picture below for the answer key.

Dmitri Gheorgheni

12.03.12 Front Page

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