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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. In "Princess's Story," who does Pri say she and her sisters are?

2. What does Matant Jo believe about her sister as said in Chapter 16?

3. According to Majorie and Valerie's Story, what happened after the revolution?

4. In "Primadonna's Story," what does Donna say Dray did for her?

5. In "Primadonna's Story," what does Donna say about her and Dray fighting?

Short Essay Questions

1. What surprises Fabiola about the Detroit airport in Chapter 1? Who is she meeting?

2. What does the lady Fabiola meets in Chapter 6 ask her? What does Fabiola see as she drives away with her cousins?

3. Who does Fabiola meet in Chapter 6? How does this person describe her cousins?

4. What does Majorie say in Majorie and Valerie's Story happened after the fall of the dictator? Why did they come to America?

5. What does Matant Jo say about Papa Legba in Chapter 16? What does she say about Fabiola believing in him?

6. What does Fabiola do to Pri's hair in Chapter 4? How does this make Fabiola feel?

7. What happens in the New York Airport in Chapter 1? What had Fabiola and her mother been planning?

8. Where does Kasim take Fabiola on a date in Chapter 14? What does he say about her when she is nervous going?

9. What does Bad Leg tell Fabiola about his leg in Chapter 8? What does she realize about him?

10. What does Fabiola tell her cousins about her mother in Chapter 2? What do her cousins say?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Kasim's name literally means "divided among many" (36). How does the meaning of his name come to play out in the novel? How does his name show how he is connected to the other characters? Write a response to his character and how he is connected to others.

Then connect his death and how the novel treats his death to the larger pattern of police shootings towards black and brown young men in American. How is the novel tying Kasim to the larger social picture? Why, through this analysis, is it Kasim who is killed?

Essay Topic 2

Fabiola says she becomes American in the novel with everything the Bees show her. How is this relationship of changing between her and the family reciprocal? How does Fabiola's arrival in the family change their lives, thoughts, and actions? What is the novel showing by this about how relationships between family works?

Essay Topic 3

In Chapter Twenty One, Fabiola dreams of the history of 8800 American Street, and then in the next chapter the detailed history of 8800 American Street is revealed. What does this structure say about how Fabiola learns the stories revealed in the novel? Are they actually being spoken to her or does she learn them in other ways? If she learns them in other ways, what are these ways of knowing? Choose three of the backstories to develop an argument about how she knows these.

Finally, what is the novel saying by having these stories revealed in this way? What is Fabiola's role related to the other characters of the novel and to the reader?

(see the answer keys)

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