Warning: This page contains spoilers for the January 7, 2026, game of Jeopardy! — please do not scroll down if you wish to avoid being spoiled. Please note that the game airs as early as noon Eastern in some U.S. television markets.
Here’s today’s Final Jeopardy (in the category Literature) for Wednesday, January 7, 2026 (Season 42, Game 88):
In a 21st century Pulitzer Prize winner, this character introduced in an 1876 work is biracial
(correct response beneath the contestants)
Today’s Jeopardy! contestants:
Jason Singer, a real estate agent from Portland, Maine
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Harvey Silikovitz, an attorney & worldwide karaoke singer originally from West Orange, New Jersey
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Cameron Berry, a data analyst & college administrator from Brighton, Massachusetts
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Andy’s Pregame Thoughts:
Today is our third of five quarterfinals in the Winter 2026 Champions Wildcard event. Our quarterfinalists today are Cameron Berry, Harvey Silikovitz, and Jason Singer; both Cameron and Harvey were very strong 1-day champions, while Jason was a 2-day champion before losing to Scott Riccardi. Jason’s run, where he was very much trying to get “the court of public opinion” onside with inviting his wife Susan back to compete on the show in some capacity, completely overran the discourse surrounding the show back in July and very much threatens to do the same again this week, with his interviews this week continuing that lobbying effort.
What Jason also has completely failed to realize, though, is that the only reason why Victoria Groce and Brandon Blackwell were invited back to the Jeopardy! Invitational Tournament after their own respective J! runs was the fact that both players had extremely strong public and/or televised trivia performances in the time since their initial appearances on the show. (And, no, online competition can not count here; I think that the Online Quiz League controversy surrounding Scott Blish is the primary reason as to why OQL or even LearnedLeague can not be counted.) Susan has no such record; in fact, after all the lobbying that has happened, I as a Jeopardy! fan actively do not want to see Susan appear on the show again, because I don’t want to give any positive reinforcement to public lobbying of the producers for contestant spots.
(Content continues below)
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Correct response: Who is Huckleberry Finn?
More information about Final Jeopardy:
(The following write-up is original content and is copyright 2026 The Jeopardy! Fan. It may not be copied without linked attribution back to this page.)
Many 21st century novels have done deeper dives into the characters of Mark Twain’s 1876 work The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and its sequels, reinterpreting many of the characters. One popular choice for reinterpretation is Huckleberry Finn, who has generally been portrayed as biracial in modern literature. The most recent example of this has come in the 2024 Pulitzer Prize-winning James by Percival Everett; James is a reimagining of the sequel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from the perspective of the fugitive slave Jim; the story differs from the original Twain work due to the separation of Huck and Jim that occurs in the original. Huck has generally been portrayed in modern literature as the son of Pap Finn and an enslaved woman, with this biracial heritage been seen as a major reason why Huck is able to connect with Jim.
I do think this is a gettable Final Jeopardy for those who are familiar with both modern and classic literature; we shall see how this Final Jeopardy clue plays, though.
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Game Recap:
Immediately after getting the game’s last Daily Double incorrect, Harvey went on a roll, picking up 10 correct after that point to take a $200 lead entering Final Jeopardy; Cameron Berry sat second while Jason Singer was in a distant third.
Final Jeopardy saw a Triple Stumper, as Harvey successfully predicted and defended against Cameron’s wager and is an automatic semifinalist; however, Cameron’s score is extremely likely to hold up for a wild card at this point, while Jason has been eliminated.
Scores going into Final:
Harvey $13,000
Cameron $12,800
Jason $3,900
Tonight’s results:
Jason $3,900 – $3,900 = $0 (Who is James #BringBackSusan)
Cameron $12,800 – $201 = $12,599 (Who is Jim?)
Harvey $13,000 – $2 = $12,998 (Who is Jim?) (Semi-Finalist)
Wild Card standings:
Monday: Stella Trout, $26,401
Tuesday: Michelle Tsai, $14,398
Wednesday: Harvey Silikovitz, $12,998
1. Cameron Berry, $12,599, 99.706% to advance
2. Bill McKinney, $12,200, 94.919% to advance
3. Dave Bond, $10,000, 54.964% to advance
4. Dargan Ware, $2,200, 0.269% to advance
5. Geoff Barnes, $800
6. Jason Singer, $0
Andy’s Thoughts:
- I am extremely happy that a $2 bet worked out this well in a tournament quarterfinal.
- Today’s J!6 clues can be found at the monthly archive.
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