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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's the only way Riley would consider himself a father figure to Cy?

2. What does Riley tattoo on Cy's chest?

3. When does Cy advance to freehand images?

4. What does Riley come to understand while at sea?

5. How does Jonty describe Mr. Riley?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Cy's afternoon employment foreshadow his future work?

2. What experience causes Cy to no longer be able to sleep under tight blankets?

3. How does sex figure into Riley's tattoo business?

4. Describe Cy's first interest in a girl and why it is disappointing.

5. What marks Cy's transition from boyhood to manhood?

6. What indication is there that "times are changing" even in a small town such as Morecambe? Why do you think this is so?

7. With what does the young Cy struggle?

8. How do Riley's and Cy's styles differ when starting a job on a client?

9. Describe the type of clients that are often drawn to Riley's tattoo parlor.

10. What is the effect of alcohol on Riley?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In Part 2, "The Lady of Many Eyes," there is a description of the baby incubation exhibition. Answer the following questions and write a well-developed, cohesive essay using examples from the text and your research or personal experience:

1. What is the baby incubation exhibition? Could something like that exist except in fiction?

2. How is the baby incubation exhibition related thematically to the rest of the book?

3. Why does Claudia go there week after week? Do you think there would ever come a time when she would stop? When? Why would she stop going there?

4. Why do you think Claudia will allow Grace to lead her away from the baby incubation exhibition? What does this say about the friendship between the two?

5. Would you ever want to go to a baby incubation exhibition? Why or why not?

Essay Topic 2

As the novel opens and then moves along to its conclusion, some characters seem to change more and some seem to stay the same. Choose one of the following and write a well-developed, cohesive essay using examples from the text and your research or personal experience:

1. Compare the character of Cy from who he seems to be during the first half of the book to the person he seems to be in the latter half. How is he alike? How different? Which "person" do you like the best? Why? How is Cy more alike and more different from Riley at the end then at the beginning?

2. Compare the character of Grace from who she seems when she is first introduced to how she seems after her hospital stay. How is she the same? How different? Which "person" do you like the best? Why? Has she changed more or less than Cy in the course of the novel?

3. Compare and contrast Riley, Claudia, and Reeda from who they seem to be when they are first introduced to who they are revealed to be by the end of the story. How much do they change or become who they really are? Or do they change? Who did you like at first and then dislike by the end of the story--and vice versa?

Essay Topic 3

This book is as much about ideas as action/events, if not more so. Choose one of the following ideas and write a persuasive essay using examples from the text and your research or personal experience:

1. Tattooing is as valid an art form as any seen in an art museum. (An idea woven throughout the entire book).

2. Horror, sin, evil and lunacy is truth on a par with the love of God and beatific goodness. (An idea found in Part 1, "The Kaiser and the Queen of Morecambe.")

3. America requires voyeurism in every attraction, because it substitutes emotion for thought. (An idea found in Part 2, "Babylon in Brooklyn.")

(see the answer keys)

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