turn up for the book

• turn-up for the book
• turn up for the books
• turn-up for the books

turn up for the book (plural turn ups for the book)

1. (idiomatic) a very unexpected, usually pleasant, surprise.

   When it was finally time to board, we got on the train to find out that we’d been put in business class. This was a turn up for the book, reclining seats and room to stretch out a little.

   • 1987: Edward Dryhurst, Gilt Off the Gingerbread

     Her mother kept well away from us, which was a turn up for the book, and for the time being at any rate, I was a model husband.

   • 2011, Michael Frayn, My Father's Fortune: A Life, →ISBN, page 104:

     All these turn ups for the book had lasting consequences.

   • 2013, David Stuart Davies, A Taste for Blood, →ISBN:

     'Well, boyo, this is a turn up for the book,' observed my friend David Llewellyn without a trace of irony. 'I never expected to wind up in a hospital bed next to you.'

• The plural form turn ups for the book is rarely used outside journalism.
• The phrase turn up for the books is not a plural form of turn up for the book, but an alternative singular form.