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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 natural occurrence does Ruth Black talk about in Alive and Alone?

2. What does Oskar think is "grody" about the story of The Sixth Borough?

3. In Why I'm Not Where Your Are, how does Thomas Schell get from the airport to Grandma's building?

4. What gift was Thomas given by Anna days before the bombings?

5. How fast is the Sixth Borough drifting away from New York in the story?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Dad relate about optimism to Oskar in the The Sixth Borough?

2. What is revealed by the long jump at the beginning of The Sixth Borough?

3. Why does the trip to Agnes Black's apartment stir Oskar's curiosity in Happiness, Happiness?

4. What is the living arrangement between Grandma and Thomas in Why I'm Not Where You Are?

5. How does Oskar Schell meet Thomas, Sr. at the beginning of Alive and Alone?

6. How does Oskar's presentation go at the beginning of Happiness, Happiness?

7. Describe Thomas's experience during the bombing of Dresden.

8. How does Thomas, Sr. discover he has a son in Why I'm Not where You Are?

9. How does Oskar overcome a phobia in Alive and Alone?

10. What major item movement happens between the sixth borough and and Manhattan as it drifts off?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Two objects in Oskar Schell's life consume him and hold him captive. They dictate how he feels and what he does with his life. Write an essay about these two items, the hold they have over Oskar, and how he resolves his connection to them:

Part 1) What is the significance of the phone and answering machine that Oskar keeps under his bed? Discuss the messages that are contained on it. Why does Oskar listen the them so often and never tell his mother about them. Who does he eventually play the messages for and why?

Part 2) Discuss the key that inspires Oskar to begin his city-wide quest. What clues about its significance emerge as he investigates? How does the key become the central driver of plot in the novel? What, in the end is the purpose of the key and how does learning this truth affect Oskar Schell?

Essay Topic 2

The end of the novel is a strangely happy one, though it does not contain anything that concretely resolves the conflicts of the novel. Write an essay about the ending of Oskar's narrative and what it means to him and to the reader:

Part 1) What is the resolution of the quest of the key? Discuss why William Black would need the key and why Dad had it in a vase. Does this resolution, in the end, offer anything illuminating to Oskar Schell regarding his father? How was the journey to this resolution more important than the destination?

Part 2) What understand do Oskar and his mother reach in the final chapter of the novel? What single request does he make of her and what concession does he give regarding her happiness? Does she make any concrete promises him regarding the future?

Part 3) Discuss the fantasy that ends the novel. What alternate reality does Oskar create for his father, beginning with his picture in the Stuff That Happened to Me book? How does this provide the novel with a bittersweet happy ending?

Essay Topic 3

Write an essay about the character of Grandma. To what extent is she portrayed as woman who beholds all the pain of the world and continues to love? Who does she lose over the course of the novel, and how does she lose each of these loved ones? What fear does this create in her? Discuss in a paragraph how her relationship with Oskar allows her to continue on in the face of heartbreak and loneliness. Who returns to her in the end of the novel, and how does she react?

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