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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. About how much time has passed between the end of the prologue and the beginning of Fall: Chapter 1?

2. Which baseball player is said to have undergone the same affliction that "had happened to Dean" (55)?

3. How many sons does Andy have with his ex-wife Lori?

4. The woman who knocks on Evvie's door at the beginning of Chapter 8, Ellen Boyd, has a job in what field?

5. The narrator states, "Evvie had been almost" what age "on the day in March" (45) when a certain character gave her a ride on a rainy day?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe Dean's reaction to Evvie's story about the reporter who came by asking about Dean.

2. What is revealed to have happened the one time when best friends Andy and Evvie had tried to view one another in a romantic light?

3. What major secret is Evvie keeping from her best friend Andy?

4. What does Evvie mean when she thinks about semicolons in relation to Dean's speech?

5. Name and discuss one coping mechanism Evvie used to make it through her days during her marriage to Tim.

6. Which comment of Frank's makes Evvie furious during Thanksgiving dinner and why?

7. What elements does Evvie name when she tells Dean the topics that concern the citizens of Calcasset?

8. How does Holmes weave together issues of class with issues of domestic abuse?

9. Discuss an instance when Holmes uses a literary device to comment on the nature of youth.

10. What is the history of the friendship between Dean and Andy?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Trace the characterization arc of Evvie’s character throughout the novel Evvie Drake Starts Over. Discuss whether Evvie is a round or flat character and whether she is a static or dynamic character.

Essay Topic 2

Discuss Holmes's purpose for juxtaposing at least two different locations in a particular way within the text of Evvie Drake Starts Over.

Essay Topic 3

Discuss Holmes's choice to tell the story of Evvie Drake Starts Over using a third person limited omniscient narrator. What elements of the novel's themes lend themselves to this choice and what are Holmes’s intended effects on the reader?

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