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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. What does Hideyo find to eat as he approaches the gorge through the mountains?

2. What do Yoko and Ko find in the wrapping cloth?

3. Who is Mrs. Masuda?

4. How has the janitor at Yoko's school changed in Chapter 8?

5. What happens to mother in Chapter 8?

Short Essay Questions

1. How do Yoko and Ko carry out the Japanese death ritual and show respect for mother?

2. What are the physical and psychological obstacles facing Hideyo in Chapter 6?

3. Describe the emotions Ko and Yoko experience in the first few pages of Chapter 9.

4. How does Ko demonstrate the importance of respect in Japanese culture?

5. What motivates Hideyo to press on as he struggles through the storm?

6. What role do Ko and Yoko play in Mother's death ritual?

7. Why do you think Hideyo is so attached to Yoko's fur coat?

8. Why does Yoko find it hard to believe that the corporal has found her and Ko?

9. How would you characterize Yoko's classmates' experience during the final months of the war based on the way she is received?

10. What evidence is there that deep down, Ko is still a young girl?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss the role of honor in the book.

Essay Topic 2

Upon learning that her story would be published, Yoko said, "I competed against life and death when young. And I won." Choose three critical turning points in the story in which Yoko had to compete "against life and death" and describe how she emerged victorious.

Essay Topic 3

There are many times throughout the book when the characters have to lie or be dishonest with people. Under what circumstances did Yoko, Ko, Hideyo, and other characters have to lie throughout their ordeal? What were the consequences, if any, for their dishonesty? Might these lies ever come back to haunt the characters in their future? If so, how?

(see the answer keys)

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