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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 issue consumes the Elephant at the start of Chapter 5?

2. According to Sportcoat in Chapter 12, what has been placed on him?

3. Which person must not come to any harm, according to Deems in Chapter 7?

4. What was the name of the Elephant’s father, as revealed in Chapter 5?

5. What is the name of Deems’s cousin, who taught him how to profit from heroin?

Short Essay Questions

1. How did Deems become a drug dealer, as revealed in Chapter 7? What was the result?

2. Who is the Governor, and what does he ask of the Elephant in Chapter 5?

3. What starts the brawl in Chapter 10?

4. What band is playing in Chapter 10? Why?

5. Who is Sister Paul? What information might she have for Sportcoat, as revealed in Chapter 8?

6. What changes is Bunch considering making, as revealed in Chapter 6?

7. What personal information does the reader learn about the Elephant at the start of Chapter 5?

8. How did the red ants come to the United States, as revealed in Chapter 7?

9. Who is Jet and what important information has he learned about the Cause, as revealed in Chapter 3?

10. Who is Hettie? What are the circumstances surrounding her death, as revealed in Chapter 1?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Analyze the author’s choice to tell this story by using a third-person, omniscient perspective. How does viewing the action through the eyes from an omniscient narrator affect the story? How would the book be different if the story was told through a first-person perspective?

Essay Topic 2

Discuss the importance of Hettie to the novel. Despite the fact that she is not physically present in the novel, she has a powerful impact on Sportcoat. Discuss Hettie’s impact on Sportcoat as well as on the novel’s plot and themes.

Essay Topic 3

Does the end justify the means? How does the novel answer this question? How would Sportcoat answer this question? How would Deems? What about the Elephant?

(see the answer keys)

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