1. Sebastian Faulks has just written “Devil May Care,” a new James Bond novel. Who of the following did not also write at least one 007 novel? (A) John Gardner, (B) Raymond Benson, (C) William F. Buckley, (D) Kingsley Amis

2. Babe Ruth hit 714 home runs in his career. What is the crime-related significance of the number? (A) the street address of a famous detective, (B) the total number of James Patterson novels, (C) the badge number of Jack Webb on the “Dragnet” television series, (D) the key to cracking a code in a Ken Follett novel

3. Which novel was not written by Dan Brown? (A) “Deception Point,” (B) “The Da Vinci Code,” (C) “Digital Fortress,” (D) “Kingdom of Shadows”

4. Which stage mystery has never been professionally produced in America? (A) “The Mousetrap,” (B) “Sleuth,” (C) “Wait Until Dark,” (D) “Witness for the Prosecution”

5. Name the actor who played Hercule Poirot in a film version of an Agatha Christie novel: (A) Robert Morley, (B) Tony Randall, (C) Peter Sellers, (D) Rex Harrison

6. What is the title of the first novel by P.D. James? (A) “Innocent Blood,” (B) “Shroud for a Nightingale,” (C) “Cover Her Face,” (D) “The Black Tower”

7. Match the following real-life criminals — (A) Charles Manson, (B) Aileen Wuornos, (C) Nathan Leopold & Richard Loeb, (D) Al Caponewith the film they inspired — (I) “Compulsion,” (II) “Little Caesar,” (III) “Monster,” (IV) “Helter Skelter”

8. Which private eye is not primarily associated with Los Angeles? (A) Elvis Cole, (B) Philip Marlowe, (C) Sam Spade, (D) Easy Rawlins

9. Who wrote “The Valley of Fear”? (A) Thomas Perry, (B) Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child, (C) Alexander McCall Smith, (D) Arthur Conan Doyle

10. After shooting a killer, this private eye was asked, “How could you?” and replied, “It was easy.” Name him: (A) Spenser, (B) Mike Hammer, (C) Sam Spade, (D) V.I. Warshawski

11. Which of these Frederick Forsyth thrillers was not made into a motion picture? (A) “The Odessa File,” (B) “The Dogs of War,” (C) “The Day of the Jackal,” (D) “The Devil’s Alternative”

12. Joe Valachi famously informed on the Mafia. How did he die? (A) thrown from a window, (B) heart attack, (C) shot in a barber’s chair, (D) shot while eating dinner

13. Who created the popular radio series “The Fat Man”? (A) Rex Stout, (B) John Dickson Carr, (C) Margery Allingham, (D) Dashiell Hammett

14. The musical “Cats” was based on the book “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats,” one of which was Macavity the mystery cat, the feline version of Professor Moriarty, the evil nemesis of Sherlock Holmes. Who wrote the book? (A) Lilian Jackson Braun, (B) Ogden Nash, (C) T.S. Eliot, (D) Ellery Queen

15. The Great Merlini, Banacek, Gideon Fell, and Henry Merrivale are famous for solving very specific mysteries. What are they? (A) serial murders, (B) “impossible” crimes, (C) special victims’ cases, (D) espionage

16. The Mystery Writers of America gives the Grand Master Award for lifetime achievement to the greatest of the greats in the genre. Who won the first one? (A) Agatha Christie, (B) Raymond Chandler, (C) Rex Stout, (D) Vincent Starrett

17. In which of these great crime films did Humphrey Bogart not appear? (A) “The Big Sleep,” (B) “In a Lonely Place,” (C) “The Asphalt Jungle,” (D) “High Sierra”

18. Name America’s all-time best-selling mystery/crime/suspense novel: (A) “I, the Jury,” (B) “The Godfather,” (C) “The Da Vinci Code,” (D) “To Kill a Mockingbird”

See answers below. If you got 17-18 right, you should write a book; 13-16 is very good; 8-12 is average; 3-7 means you have some catching up to do; fewer than that, you are a closet romance reader.

Mr. Penzler is the proprietor of the Mysterious Bookshop in Manhattan and the series editor of the annual Best American Mystery Series. He can be reached at ottopenzler@mysteriousbookshop.com.

Readers of this column, perhaps not surprisingly, appear to be, on the whole, an extraordinarily sophisticated coterie of crime connoisseurs, if my e-mails are any evidence.

Well-read, articulate, and opinionated, as any serious reader is bound to be, they (which is to say, you) have corrected me when I made a mistake (humiliating; even if it was two years ago, I’m still haunted by it), complimented me (flattering), disagreed with me (irritating), and asked questions about long-ago favorite writers and books (challenging).

So, only because you are who you are, here’s another of my challenges, which could only be met by such an impressively erudite readership:

ANSWERS

1C; 2 C; 3 D; 4 A; 5 B; 6 C; 7 A-IV, B-III, C-I, D-II; 8 C; 9 D; 10 B; 11 D; 12B; 13 D; 14 cC 15 B; 16 A; 17 C;18 D.