Could you be a genius?

Published on: 04 September 2018 Author: Ali Spakes

What would it be like if you were cleverer than anyone else you met? And how could you ever end up with a bank robber and car thief as your best friend?

When twelve-year-old genius Jack Mattingly gets accidentally abducted by the man who's just stolen his parents' car, he ends up on a life changing journey of burglary, robbery, TV quizzes and far too much sugar on his Weetabix.Car-Jacked

But what would make a kid with an IQ of 170 go down this road? If you're not a genius, you might not understand. And if you're not sure whether you're a genius, just take Ali Sparkes' Car-Jacked Genius Test and find out...

Q1. You are just dozing off in Maths when your teacher suddenly pounces on you with the following challenge: I'm going to the pet shop to buy a pet. Rabbits are £25, mice are £7 and pythons are £500. I have £1,571 savings to spend. How many animals can I take home if I buy every kind of pet?

You answer:

  1. You could take home three pythons, two rabbits and three mice.
  2. You could take home one python, 40 rabbits and ten mice – but it's possible that there would be fewer mice and rabbits by the time you got home as you can't afford cages for the mammals or a tank for the snake and would have to put them all in a bag for life. Ironically this would end in death for the rabbits and mice and a good dinner for the python.
  3. I'm phoning the RSPCA and reporting you right now.

Q2. You are walking down the road in Paris, minding your own business, when a woman jumps out of a car, waves a thick envelope at you and yells: "Rapide! Vous avez cinq secondes pour prendre cette énorme somme d'argent. Je travaille pour la télévision française et tu vis sur la série Random Millionaire!"

What do you do?

  1. Get out your French-English translation app, try work out what she's just said and then look up ten seconds later and wonder where she went.
  2. Take the envelope and reply: "Merci beaucoup. Quand serai-je à la télévision française, alors? " Then go to the Ferrari showroom.
  3. Scream and run away. You are rightly scared of envelopes and the French.

Q3. Jimmy has to catch a bus into town to see Justin Bieber. The concert starts at 7.30pm. The journey usually takes 37 minutes and he has caught the 6.45pm bus – but temporary traffic lights have been set up, holding the traffic back with a three minute wait at three points in the journey. And the walk from the bus stop takes 13 minutes. When will Jimmy make it to the concert venue?

  1. Jimmy will arrive at 7.44pm and miss 14 minutes of the concert.
  2. Jimmy will get off the bus stop but run, whimpering, into the box office, collect his tickets and fling himself inside the concert hall just eight minutes late... in time to wait another THREE HOURS until the Justin Bieber set ACTUALLY STARTS.
  3. Wait. Jimmy is catching a bus to see Justin Bieber? No. Just no. His friends will find him at the bus stop and hold him back until the bus has departed. If he has any.

WHAT'S YOUR SCORE ?

Mostly 1s

Yep. You're a genius. Read Car-Jacked; it's got a boy genius, a bank job, helicopters and hair dye in it.

Mostly 2s

You're a genius too. Read Car-Jacked; it's got car chases, attack dogs, monster mothers and Latin gags in it.

Mostly 3s

You want the truth? The world is just not ready for your kind of genius. Read Car-Jacked ; it's got peat bogs, burglary, running from the police and a really average McDonald's Egg and Bacon McMuffin in it.

Topics: Adventure, Thriller, Bookbuzz, Crime, Features