View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. How many weekends of public service does Tyger have to perform for his pool prank?

2. The comment that “as much as [Greyson] loved the Thunderhead, he hated it right now” (95) offers an example of which of the following?

3. Which of the following is Greyson’s middle name?

4. Which of the following is an ingredient in Xenocrates’s preferred libation?

5. What language is spoken in Texas in the novel?

Short Essay Questions

1. What reasons does the Thunderhead give for finding employment for all people who want it?

2. There is a note that Scythe Anastasia “was beginning to hate having to take the obsequious self-driving cars. Funny, but it had never bothered her before her apprenticeship. Citra Terranova had never had a burning desire to learn to drive—but Scythe Anastasia now did. Perhaps it was part of the self-determined nature of being a scythe that made her feel uncomfortable as a passive passenger in a publicar. Or maybe it was the spirit of Scythe Curie rubbing off on her” (38). What rhetorical appeal/s is/are present in the passage?

3. Why does Munira carry the nickname among the library clerks that she does?

4. What reasons does Xenocrates rehearse for visiting his bathhouse more frequently as the year draws to a close?

5. What reasons does the Thunderhead give for the inefficiencies in the Office of Unsavory Affairs?

6. Scythe Brahms observes that “five highly developed senses could often have the semblance of a sixth” (6). To what sixth sense does Brahms refer? What purpose might its denial serve for the genre?

7. Anastasia notes that the site of the Mortality Memorial is “a city underserved by the scythedom” because it “was too macabre for them” and “in very poor taste” (45). Why would scythes, whose work is in killing people, find celebrations of death macabre and in poor taste, per the novel?

8. How does Purity verify Slayd’s identity, and why does she do so?

9. The Thunderhead remarks that its Charter Regions are experiments (59). What experiment is it conducting in Texas? What result does it expect?

10. What reasons does Scythe Constantine give for the scythedom’s efforts to protect Anastasia when she is excused from gleaning?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The Thunderhead notes, “To deny humanity the lesson of consequences would be a mistake” (489). Is the Thunderhead’s assessment accurate? What in the text and in experience suggests whether it is or not? How does it do so?

Essay Topic 2

Consider the following passage: “‘He didn’t go out with the garbage,’ Scythe Rand said. ‘I took care of it myself, then spread his ashes in a field of wild bluebonnets. Just saying” (306). Assuming that Rand is being truthful, what does the passage imply about her? What in the text affirms the implication? How is the implication supported?

Essay Topic 3

It is clear that the novel belongs to the genre of young adult fiction. It is also clear that the novel belongs to the genre of science fiction. Explain how it does so, noting ways in which it follows and fails to follow conventions of the genre. (Note that being able to do so entails being able to articulate those conventions, likely with illustrative examples.)

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 887 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample