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

Short Answer Questions

1. Mattie’s principle concern about Royal Loomis in Chapter 18 is that he’s never told her what?

2. How does Miss Wilcox appear in response to Mattie’s decision about her future in Chapter 28?

3. What is the name of Royal Loomis’s eldest brother?

4. Weaver is beaten up by three men who are what in Chapter 22?

5. What does Mattie give Weaver money for at the end of the novel?

Short Essay Questions

1. How is the character of Mr. Maxwell introduced in Chapter 20? What are Mattie’s impressions of this character?

2. What information does Martha Miller present to Mattie regarding her engagement to Royal Loomis in Chapter 29?

3. What information does Miss Wilcox confess to Mattie in Chapter 17?

4. Where is Miss Wilcox planning to depart for in Chapter 27? How does Mattie visit her teacher?

5. What event takes place surrounding Weaver Smith’s character in Chapter 22?

6. What event leads to Mattie’s employment at the Glenmore Hotel? How?

7. What does Mattie discover through Grace Brown’s letters in Chapter 19? What are her thoughts on this discovery?

8. How are the themes of duty and responsibility illustrated in Chapters 23-26?

9. How is the theme of appearances versus reality manifested in A Northern Light?

10. What work has Mattie begun doing for Miss Wilcox in Chapter 17? What does she discover when she arrives?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Describe and discuss the murder of Grace Brown at the Covewood Lodge in 1906. Who was tried and convicted of the murder? What transcripts remain of the trial? What evidence was presented? Where in the Adirondacks did the murder occur? How does the author incorporate this setting into A Northern Light?

Essay Topic 2

Discuss the early feminist movement and the suffrage movement in the United States. When did women begin to demand the right to vote and when was the right granted? What are some examples of early feminist authors, and what were their main causes at the turn of the century? How does author Jennifer Donnelly depict this movement in the novel?

Essay Topic 3

Analyze and discuss the character of Uncle Fifty in the novel. Where does Uncle Fifty live? How is his lifestyle different than that of his brother, Mattie’s father? What does Mattie think of her uncle?

(see the answer keys)

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