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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. Why was Adrian fired from his Ford job?

2. How does Kasim look when he sees Fabiola's new look in Chapter 18?

3. Who confronts Fabiola in Chapter 25?

4. Where do Fabiola and the cousins go in Chapter 24?

5. Who is at the game with Pri in Chapter 24?

Short Essay Questions

1. In "Drayton's Story," what does Dray reveal about his connection to Phillip? What had he felt because of that connection?

2. What do the Francois sisters intend in Chapter 26 to pay back Q? How does Fabiola feel about this?

3. What does Fabiola tell her cousins in Chapter 27 about her and her mother? How does she connect this to Bag Leg?

4. What do Kasim and Fabiola do in Chapter 28 at Kasim's house? What does Fabiola tell Kasim at the end of the Chapter?

5. What happens to Donna in the evening in Chapter 23? What does Fabiola think about America?

6. In "Drayton's Story," what does Dray say about dying? What does he realize?

7. In Chapter 30, what does Dray do to Fabiola? What does she tell him to do?

8. In "Kasim's Story," how does Kasim say Dray and Q have been for him and his mother?

9. In Chapter 31 where does Fabiola say she was when the Haiti earthquake hit? How does she relate this to when she opens her eyes in the present?

10. What does Fabiola see on Donna's phone in Chapter 18? What does she do with this?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

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?

Essay Topic 2

Donna and Dray's love for one another is complicated, while Fabiola and Kasim's relationship is fairly straightforward, but ends tragically. What role does love play for for these couples? What is their relationship with one another? How does it allow them to feel or change? How do they play out their feelings in other parts of their lives in their relationships?

Finally, answer in an analytical claim: why does the novel contrast these two examples of romantic relationships?

Essay Topic 3

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?

(see the answer keys)

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