How good is your hoax-radar? Try this April Fool's Day Quiz, which presents sixteen claims that have been made in the media: eight genuine news stories, and eight April Fool's jokes. (Guesswork and hunches earned me 12 out of 16.)

And if you like reading about hoaxes and forgeries, visit the library and check out the following:

Fakes and Forgeries: The True Crime Stories of History's Greatest Deceptions, by Brian Innes. Details the world's most renowned fakes, and explains why it took so long to detect some of them.

Great Forgers and Famous Fakes, by Charles Hamilton. Hundreds of magnified examples of handwriting forgeries.

Counterfeit, Mis-struck, and Unofficial U.S. Coins, by Don Taxay. A critically acclaimed guide to detecting counterfeits and altered coins.

A Treasury of Deception: Liars, Misleaders, Hoodwinkers, and the Extraordinary True Stories of History's Greatest Hoaxes, Fakes, and Frauds, by Michael Farquhar. The greatest deceptions of all time, grouped by con artists, the press, military trickery, scientific fraud, imposters, and more.

Attributing Authorship, by Harold Love. The best comprehensive study of authorship in literary writing. The chapter on literary forgeries is superb.

The Gospel Hoax: Morton Smith's Invention of Secret Mark, by Stephen Carlson. Find out how a biblical scholar fooled academia for almost 50 years with "The Secret Gospel of Mark", in which Jesus is portrayed homoerotically.