Books and Authors question: In a comparison beginning with An Era of Darkness, which of the following book–author pairs is incorrectly matched?

The verified answer to “Books and Authors question: In a comparison beginning with An Era of Darkness, which of the following book–author pairs is incorrectly matched?” is An Era of Darkness — William Dalrymple, option B. The source-backed, question-specific record explains: An Era of Darkness is correctly associated with Shashi Tharoor. These three details—title, author, and language—form the decisive bibliographical combination required here. The distractor set (The Last Mughal — William Dalrymple; A Brief History of Time — Stephen Hawking; Capital, Volume I — Karl Marx) must therefore be tested as complete statements: one true fragment cannot make an entire option correct. A common examination trap is to confuse an author’s nationality with the language of composition, or a translation date with first publication. Revision takeaway: remember the compact chain “An Era of Darkness — Shashi Tharoor — English — 2016,” and connect it with The Great Indian Novel for stronger recall. This evidence establishes the bibliographic relationship required in this Books and Authors item. A correct solution must preserve the exact title, author, publication context, language, award or comparison requested by the stem. Similar periods, genres or national traditions do not make two book–author pairs interchangeable. Option B gives An Era of Darkness — William Dalrymple and satisfies the wording of the question. The remaining choices—The Last Mughal — William Dalrymple, A Brief History of Time — Stephen Hawking and Capital, Volume I — Karl Marx—do not satisfy the complete requirement. Depending on the stem, a distractor may name a real writer but attach the wrong title, use a related work by another author, reverse a correct association, or present a correct pair when the question specifically asks for the incorrect match. The reliable checking method is to identify the reference title first, recall or verify its credited author.