Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Mitchell Symons is the author of Why Girls Can't Throw, as well as This Book, That Book, and The Other Book. The creator of dozens of crossword, trivia, and humor books, Symons is a columnist for London's Sunday Express.

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Did you know that . . .

John Wayne once won the dog Lassie from its owner in a poker game?

Hijinks is the only word in the English language with three dotted letters in a row?

The shortest war in history, between England and Zanzibar in 1896, lasted only thirty-eight minutes?

Want to learn which U.S. president was a descendant of King Edward III? Or which famous people lived to read their own obituaries? Then That Book is the book for you! From history to science to pop culture, here is an irresistible, enlightening, and absolutely addictive treasure trove of fascinating and fun little-known facts that no one needs to know—an indispensable boon to every true lover of trivia and marvelous minutia!

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That Book

HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.

Fathers

Uma Thurman's father was the first American to be ordained a Buddhist monk.

Stephen King's father went out for a pack of cigarettes and never returned.

Julianna Margulies's father wrote the "Plop, Plop, Fizz, Fizz" jingle for Alka-Seltzer.

Laura Dern was bullied at school because her father Bruce Dern—was "the only person to kill John Wayne in the movies."

Rachel Weisz's father invented the artificial respirator.

Bob Marley had a white Liverpudlian father.

Elvis Costello's father sang the "I'm Secret Lemonade Drinker" jingle for B. White's lemonade.

Eminem, Eartha Kit, Lance Armstrong, Charlie Chaplin, Bill Clinton, Evander Holyfield (whose father had twenty-seven children), Vanilla Ice, Eric Clapton, Rod Steiger, Lee Tevino, Naomi Campbell and Mike Tyson never knew their fathers.

The fathers of George Michael and Yusuf Islam (Cal Stevens) were both Greek restaurateurs.

Stockard Channing received a substantial inheritance at the age of fifteen after the death of her shipping-magnate father.

Ben Affleck's reformed-alcoholic father, Tim, became Robert Downey Jr.'s drug counselor.

The fathers of Roger Moore, Burt Reynolds, Queen Latifah, Arnold Sehwarzenegger and Eddie Murphy were all policemen.

The fathers of Otis Redding, Jane Austen, David Frost, Alice Cooper, John Hurt, Ike Turner, Denzel Washington, Rita Coolidge, Aretha Franklin, Laurence Olivier, Tori Amos, Nina Simone, Pearl Bailey, Ingmar Berman, Alistair Cooke, George McGovern, Walter Mondale, Agnes Moorehead, Dean Rusk, Frances McDormand and Jessica Simpson were all clergymen.

The fathers of Harry Houdini, Erich Segal, Jackie Mason and Isaac Asimov were all rabbis.

The fathers of Gil Scott-Heron, Ian McShane and Cohn Farrell were all professional soccer players.

The fathers of Glenn Close, Pamela Stephenson. Katharine Hepburn, Jacqueline Bisset, Brian Dc Palma, Jane Seymour, Bill Pullman, Edvard Munch, Willem Dafoe, Kate Bush, Judi Dench, Tom Stoppard, Humphrey Bogart, Ben Kingsley, Hillary Clinton, Lisa Kudrow, Reese Witherspoon and Gavin Rossdale were all doctors.

Excerpted from That Bookby Mitchell Symons Copyright © 2006 by Mitchell Symons. Excerpted by permission.
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