The Book of the Year 2019

The team behind hit podcast No Such Thing as a Fish return with another eye-opening tour of the incredible year you didn't know you'd lived through.

Another fine book of odd stories from No Such Thing As A Fish. I look forward to next year’s edition.

The Book Of The Year 2019 is a treat for all the ages. It's stuffed with fascinating facts from the past twelve months . . . genuine talent and bucketloads of personality . . . It's intellectual but always warm-hearted

Great fun, ideal to pick up and absorb in bite-sized chunks. Plus it might make a welcome change from buying the Guinness Book Of World Records every year *****

You can really dip in anywhere and be sure of finding something unexpected and amusing . . . the authors always remain curious and excited: for all their comic strengths, they are never too cynical to be fascinated. Despite everything, they still regards the world as a place of wonder

The sheer scope of the research takes the breath away, and the humour is perfectly judged.

Bitesize chunks of truth in a year of fake news. If you love fact-based trivia, you'll get a kick out of this.

No Such Thing as a Fish is a team of researchers who work on the BBC TV show QI. Each week they gather together in their Covent Garden office and record a podcast discussing the most interesting facts they’ve discovered over the previous seven days. 
 
In the five years since it launched, the show has been downloaded more than 200 million times, won multiple awards, been transformed into the spin-off topical BBC Two TV series No Such Thing as the News, performed national and international tours (including selling out the Hammersmith Apollo and the Sydney Opera House along the way), and was named one of iTunes’ top 10 most downloaded podcasts of 2016, 2017 and 2018. 
 
The team is made up of James Harkin, Andrew Hunter Murray, Anna Ptaszynski and Dan Schreiber. 
 
James is a script editor on QI, with a dozen series and seven bestselling books under his belt. He has also appeared on TV quiz shows Fifteen to One and Only Connect, reaching the semi-finals in the latter and embarrassingly crashing out of the former. 
 
Andrew is a writer and comedian who also contributes to Private Eye magazine. His first novel, The Last Day, will be published in spring 2020. His nickname among No Such Thing as a Fish fans is ‘Lightning’ (or so he claims). 
 
Anna is a script editor on QI who has previously worked in Scottish politics and Australian advertising, as well as selling fruit wine and hay-baling in the Highlands. She refuses to join Twitter. #GetAnnaOnTwitter 
 
Dan is a comedian and producer who co-created the award-winning BBC Radio 4 series The Museum of Curiosity; has fronted numerous TV shows, including his own Channel 4 documentary; and, as a stand-up, saw his debut show named at the time as one of the top 100 most favourably reviewed shows of the Edinburgh Fringe. He ranked 100th.

The Book of the Year is back, with yet another pro-rogues gallery of the most amazing, audacious and absolutely absurd news of 2019. 
 
Once again the fact-finding foursome behind the podcast No Such Thing As A Fish have been newspaper-trawling and website-crawling to create your ultimate guide to the past twelve months. 
 
Learn which of Donald Trump’s claims are so bizarre they can’t even be fact-checked. Find out why every single French MP received camembert in the post. And get to the bottom of all the improvements made to the Ford company’s robotic bum. All this and much, much more, including the news that: 
 
· Two tourists planning to visit the Norwegian village of Å, ended up 1,310km away, in Aa. 
· Five guys were arrested at a branch of Five Guys. 
· Hollyoaks was partly written by the British government. 
· The US town of Hell froze over. 
 
From Assange to Zuckerberg, taking in Cardi B, CCTV, D-Day, and eSports, The Book of the Year is the only book you need to make senseof the year, no matter how senseless it might have seemed.

Your Definitive Guide to the World’s Weirdest News

The Book of the Year 2018

The team behind No Such Thing As A Fish return with another eye-opening tour of the incredible year you didn’t know you’d lived through.

Hugely enjoyable . . . Deserves to become an annual institution . . . Its tone is just right: deadpan, sharp and disarmingly offbeat.

The Book of the Year [is] a compendium of topical facts in 365 categories. It’s laced with their dry wit, and likely to end up in many a pub-quizzer’s Christmas stocking.

A factually relevant look at a baffling 12 months.

QI is such an institution that even the programme’s researchers are taking over the world. Fully justified that is too, as anyone who’s heard their podcast, No Such Thing As A Fish, will confirm. It’s packed with killer facts – and so is this book.

If you love funny facts as much as we love funny facts then you should get your funny fact-loving faces in front of The Book of the Year.

Absolutely ideal for the Christmas holidays.

A bumper anthology of ridiculous but true facts from the anoraks (and QI researchers) behind hit podcast No Such Thing As A Fish.

Both fantastically absorbing and entertaining.

The Book of The Year will prove the perfect Christmas gift, the ideal conversation starter (and stopper), and the ultimate source of wisdom for all lovers of trivia.

The weirdest facts behind the headlines of the previous 12 months.

__________ 
‘My favourite geeks. Hilarious. Sideways. Brilliant.’ Tim Minchin 
 
In a year dominated by Russian collusion and Brexit confusion, The Book of the Year returns with another dose of barely believable yet wholly unimpeachable facts and stories from the past twelve months. 
 
Every week for the past four years, Dan, James, Anna and Andy – the creators of the award-winning, chart-topping comedy podcast No Such Thing As A Fish – have wowed each other and millions of their listeners with the most astonishing trivia they have learned over the previous seven days. Now, once again, they have put down the microphones, picked up their pencils, and transformed a year’s worth of weird and wonderful happenings into one uplifting book that you won’t be able to put down. 
 
Discover how Peruvian mummies affected the World Cup, and why Love Island contestants are experts in game theory – as well as hundreds of stories that may have passed you by entirely, including the news that: 
 
· NASA sent a man with a fear of heights to the International Space Station. 
· An ice hotel in Canada caught fire. 
· Mark Zuckerberg’s private data was compromised while he was talking to Congress about compromised data. 
 
From Kim Jong Un’s personal potty to Jeremy Corbyn’s valuable vegetables, The Book of the Year 2018 is an eye-opening tour of yet another incredible year you didn’t know you’d lived through.

The Audiobook of The Year (2018)

No Such Thing As A Fish is a team of researchers who work on the BBC TV show QI. Each week they gather together in their Covent Garden office and record a podcast discussing the most interesting facts they’ve discovered over the previous seven days. In the three years since it launched, the show has attracted 1.4 million weekly listeners, won multiple awards, been transformed into the spin-off topical BBC2 TV series No Such Thing As The News, performed a sell-out UK tour, and been named one of iTunes’ top 10 most downloaded podcasts of 2016. 
 
The team is made up of James Harkin, Andrew Hunter Murray, Anna Ptaszynski and Dan Schreiber. 
 
James is the head writer on QI, with ten series and five bestselling books under his belt. He has also appeared on TV quiz shows Fifteen to One and Only Connect, reaching the semi-finals in the latter and embarrassingly crashing out of the former. 
 
Andrew is a writer and comedian who also contributes to Private Eye magazine, is a member of the improv troupe Austentatious, and has staged his own one-man show at the Edinburgh Fringe. He is known to fans (his mum) as ‘Lightning’. 
 
Anna is a QI scriptwriter who has previously worked in Scottish politics and Australian advertising, as well as selling fruit wine and hay-baling in the Highlands. She refuses to join Twitter. #GetAnnaOnTwitter 
 
Dan loves yetis.

Random House presents The Audiobook of the Year 2018, written and read by the team behind hit podcast No Such Thing as a Fish; James Harkin, Jane Hill, Dan Schreiber, Andrew Hunter Murray and Anna Ptaszynski. 
 
Think you know what happened in 2018? Think again. 
 
Following hot on the heels of the success of The Audiobook of the Year (or, more precisely, twelve months later), The Audiobook of the Year 2018 bravely delves behind the headlines to sniff out the best and most bizarre facts of the past 12 months. 
 
Compiled and written by the creators of the award-winning hit comedy podcast No Such Thing As A Fish, all of whom are researchers for QI, it will establish - among other things - that: 
 
· Britain’s first robot shop assistant was sacked after a week 
· Donald Trump claimed the US sells F52 planes to Norway, even though F52 planes only exist in the game Call of Duty 
· During the Winter Olympics, it was so windy during the Women's Slopestyle Final that every single competitor was blown off her snowboard. 
· A snail racing competition in Plymouth was postponed because the snails were too 'sluggish' to take part. 
 
Ranging from the distinctly offbeat to the wonderfully ludicrous - from the South Africans who were rationed to just one toilet flush per day, to the Nutella riots spreading across France, via the Miami bitcoin conference that stopped accepting bitcoin - The Audiobook of the Year promises a fact for every occasion and will prove the perfect Christmas gift for all trivia buffs.

The Book of the Year

A hilarious, trivia-filled survey of the past twelve months by the team behind the award-winning podcast, No Such Thing As A Fish

Jolly, packed with impressive and silly facts . . . hooray for No Such Thing As A Fish.

It’s fair to say the podcast has been “quite” successful. Its episodes have been listened to more than 100 million times, with 1.5 million new streams every month . . . The Book of the Year [is] a compendium of topical facts in 365 categories. It’s laced with their dry wit, and likely to end up in many a pub-quizzer’s Christmas stocking.

[No Such Thing As A Fish] drop so many facts your head will spin!

No Such Thing As A Fish is the hit podcast presented by the funny guys and girls at QI . . . The Book of the Year shares all of the lesser known facts from the year of 2017.

Brilliant and funny . . . educational as well as entertaining. A rare but valuable combination.

Hugely enjoyable . . . this tome is just right: deadpan, sharp and disarmingly offbeat.

QI is such an institution that even the programme’s researchers are taking over the world. Fully justified that is too, as anyone who’s heard their podcast, No Such Thing As A Fish, will confirm. It’s packed with killer facts – and so is this book.

Since 2003, the Elves have unearthed countless weird and wonderful truths and gems of general ignorance for QI, their 100-million-times-downloaded weekly podcast No Such Thing as A Fish, topical TV spin-off No Such Thing as the News and their many books, such as their newly released Book of the Year.

The Book Of The Year will prove the perfect Christmas gift, the ideal conversation starter (and stopper), and the ultimate source of wisdom for all lovers of trivia.

In a year when much of the news was believable but fake, comes a book packed with stories that are unbelievable but true. 
 
The Book of the Year is a hilarious guide to 2017’s most extraordinary events, unearthed by the creators of the award-winning hit comedy podcast No Such Thing As A Fish. Each week, over a million people tune in to find out what bizarre and astonishing facts Dan, James, Anna and Andy have found out over the previous seven days. Now the gang have turned their attention to the news of the past twelve months. 
 
You’ll discover the curious details behind the main headlines – how Donald Trump slept on the 66th floor of a 58-storey building, what effect Brexit had on Coco Pops, and why China’s president can’t stand Winnie the Pooh – as well as hundreds of stories you may have missed entirely, like the news that: 
 
- Qatar built a refugee camp for camels. 
- The world’s first avocado restaurant ran out of avocados on its first day. 
- The victim of Britain’s first ever shark attack ended up with a cut thumb. 
 
From strange inventions to baffling elections, via a surprising amount of sausage news, The Book of the Year is an eye-opening tour of the incredible year you didn’t know you’d lived through.

In a year when much of the news was believable but fake, comes a book packed with stories that are unbelievable but true. 
 
The Book of the Year is a hilarious guide to 2017’s most extraordinary events, unearthed by the creators of the award-winning hit comedy podcast No Such Thing As A Fish. Each week, over a million people tune in to find out what bizarre and astonishing facts Dan, James, Anna and Andy have found out over the previous seven days. Now the gang have turned their attention to the news of the past twelve months. 
 
You’ll discover the curious details behind the main headlines – how Donald Trump slept on the 66th floor of a 58-storey building, what effect Brexit had on Coco Pops, and why China’s president can’t stand Winnie the Pooh – as well as hundreds of stories you may have missed entirely, like the news that: 
 
· Qatar built a refugee camp for camels. 
· The world’s first avocado restaurant ran out of avocados on its first day. 
· The victim of Britain’s first ever shark attack ended up with a cut thumb. 
 
From strange inventions to baffling elections, via a surprising amount of sausage news, The Book of the Year is an eye-opening tour of the incredible year you didn’t know you’d lived through.

The Audiobook of the Year

A hilarious, trivia-filled survey of the past twelve months by the team behind the award-winning podcast, No Such Thing As A Fish.

No Such Thing As A Fish (Author) No Such Thing as a Fish is a team of researchers who work on the BBC TV show QI. Each week they gather together in their Covent Garden office and record a podcast discussing the most interesting facts they’ve discovered over the previous seven days. 
 
In the five years since it launched, the show has been downloaded more than 200 million times, won multiple awards, been transformed into the spin-off topical BBC Two TV series No Such Thing as the News, performed national and international tours (including selling out the Hammersmith Apollo and the Sydney Opera House along the way), and was named one of iTunes’ top 10 most downloaded podcasts of 2016, 2017 and 2018. 
 
The team is made up of James Harkin, Andrew Hunter Murray, Anna Ptaszynski and Dan Schreiber. 
 
James is a script editor on QI, with a dozen series and seven bestselling books under his belt. He has also appeared on TV quiz shows Fifteen to One and Only Connect, reaching the semi-finals in the latter and embarrassingly crashing out of the former. 
 
Andrew is a writer and comedian who also contributes to Private Eye magazine. His first novel, The Last Day, will be published in spring 2020. His nickname among No Such Thing as a Fish fans is ‘Lightning’ (or so he claims). 
 
Anna is a script editor on QI who has previously worked in Scottish politics and Australian advertising, as well as selling fruit wine and hay-baling in the Highlands. She refuses to join Twitter. #GetAnnaOnTwitter 
 
Dan is a comedian and producer who co-created the award-winning BBC Radio 4 series The Museum of Curioisty; has fronted numerous TV shows, including his own Channel 4 documentary; and, as a stand-up, saw his debut show named at the time as one of the top 100 most favourably reviewed shows of the Edinburgh Fringe. He ranked 100th. Jane Hill (Reader) Jane Hill was born and brought up in Portsmouth. She has worked in radio for twenty years, firstly as a journalist and then as head of programming for an award-winning group of local commercial radio stations. She is now a freelance writer and broadcaster and is also pursuing a career as a stand-up comedian. She has a passion for live music and also for travelling, particularly in the USA. Jane is the author of Grievous Angel, Murder Ballad and Can't Let Go.

Random House Audiobooks present The Audiobook of the Year, written and read by the team behind hit podcast No Such Thing As A Fish: James Harkin, Andrew Hunter Murray, Anna Ptaszynski and Dan Schreiber. 
 
 
In a year when much of the news was believable but fake, comes an audiobook packed with stories that are unbelievable but true. 
 
The Audiobook of the Year is a feature-length edition of the award-winning hit comedy podcast No Such Thing As A Fish. Each week, over a million people tune in to find out what bizarre and astonishing facts Dan, James, Anna and Andy have found out over the previous seven days. Now the gang have turned their attention to the news of the past twelve months. 
 
You’ll discover the curious details behind the main headlines – how Donald Trump slept on the 66th floor of a 58-storey building, what effect Brexit had on Coco Pops, and why China’s president can’t stand Winnie the Pooh – as well as hundreds of stories you may have missed entirely, like the news that: 
 
- Qatar built a refugee camp for camels 
- 2,000 bees were stolen in Beeston 
- The victim of Britain’s first ever shark attack ended up with a cut thumb. 
 
 
From bizarre arrests to baffling elections, via a surprising amount of sausage news, The Audiobook of the Year is an eye-opening tour of the incredible year you didn’t know you’d lived through. 
 
‘Jolly, packed with impressive and silly facts . . . hooray for No Such Thing As A Fish.’ – Observer 
 
‘Knowledge-packed and riotously funny.’ – The Times

No Such Thing As A Fish

Andrew Hunter Murray

Anna Ptaszynski

Dan Schreiber

James Harkin

Brought to you by Penguin. 
 
The Audiobook of the Year is back, with yet another pro-rogues gallery of the most amazing, audacious and absolutely absurd news of 2019. 
 
Featuring an audio-exclusive bonus chapter and live recordings for the Book of the Year 2019 tour. 
 
 Once again the fact-finding foursome behind the podcast No Such Thing As A Fish have been newspaper-trawling and website-crawling to create your ultimate guide to the past twelve months. 
 
 Learn which of Donald Trump’s claims are so bizarre they can’t even be fact-checked. Find out why every single French MP received camembert in the post. And get to the bottom of all the improvements made to the Ford company’s robotic bum. All this and much, much more, including the news that: 
 
 · Two tourists planning to visit the Norwegian village of Å, ended up 1,310km away, in Aa. 
 · Five guys were arrested at a branch of Five Guys. 
 · Hollyoaks was partly written by the British government. 
 · The US town of Hell froze over. 
 
 From Assange to Zuckerberg, taking in Cardi B, CCTV, D-Day, and eSports, The Book of the Year is the only book you need to make sense of the year, no matter how senseless it might have seemed.

No Such Thing As A Fish

Praise for The Audiobook of the Year 2019

The sheer scope of the research takes the breath away, and the humour is perfectly judged.

... packed with killer facts.

Bitesize chunks of truth in a year of fake news. If you love fact-based trivia, you'll get a kick out of this.

The sheer scope of the research takes the breath away, and the humour is perfectly judged.

... packed with killer facts.

Bitesize chunks of truth in a year of fake news. If you love fact-based trivia, you'll get a kick out of this.

The sheer scope of the research takes the breath away, and the humour is perfectly judged.

... packed with killer facts.

Bitesize chunks of truth in a year of fake news. If you love fact-based trivia, you'll get a kick out of this.

Books by No Such Thing As A Fish

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter