Random House Books has acquired UK and Commonwealth rights to what will, quite literally, be The Book of the Year (because that's the title). The authors are the team behind one of the UK’s most successful podcasts, No Such Thing As A Fish and the popular BBC Two show No Such Thing As The News.

The team comprises James Harkin, Andrew Hunter Murray, Anna Ptaszynski and Dan Schreiber. James is the head writer on BBC2’s QI, with 10 series and five best-selling books under his belt. He has also appeared on TV quiz shows 15-1 and Only Connect, reaching the semi-finals of the latter. Andrew is a writer and comedian, who is a member of the hit improv troupe Austentatious and has staged his own one-man show at the Edinburgh Fringe and in London’s Soho Theatre. Anna previously worked for an MSP in the Scottish Parliament and dabbled in marketing for a Melbourne theatre company.  Dan co-created and co-produced seven series of BBC Radio 4’s The Museum of Curiosity, presented his own Channel 4 documentary on UFO conspiracies, and has appeared as a panellist on numerous TV and radio shows.

Accompanied by a major publicity and marketing campaign, The Book of the Year will be precisely what its title promises: an entertaining, fact-filled journey into the more bizarre reaches of the past twelve months. Among many, many other things, it will establish:

·         Who has played the greater number of golf rounds since the turn of 2017: Rory McIlroy or Donald Trump

·         Precisely how many members of Britain’s Parachute Regiment aren’t actually qualified to use parachutes

·         Why a parliamentary inquiry into why parliamentary inquiries take so long has been delayed

 Venturing fearlessly from Australia (where toad-flavoured sausages are being deployed to stop predators from eating real toads) to India (where you can now buy a washing machine with a special curry stain button), this will be the year, not as the headlines defined it, but as it ought to be remembered.

No Such Thing As A Fish says: ‘We promised Penguin Random House we’d write the book of the year and we think the title is a very strong start. Right now the world is full of news that is believable but fake. This book will be packed with news that’s unbelievable but true.’

Random House Books will publish in hardback, audio and ebook editions on 2nd November 2017.