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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 Will think the middle drawer of Shawn’s dresser looks like in Chapter One?

2. What does Buck take out of his pocket in Chapter Two?

3. What do we learn that Shawn taught Will the night after Dani died?

4. What does Buck tell Will to do when Will is scared by the elevator in Chapter Two?

5. What did Shawn teach Will how to do on the playground as Will tells us in Chapter One?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Will insist to the reader directly after he introduces himself in the beginning of Chapter One? Why does he say he does this?

2. What is Will’s plan with Shawn’s gun in Chapter One?

3. What is the metaphor Will describes in Chapter Three about God displaying his children?

4. What does Will think of when the girl in the elevator shows him the picture from her wallet in Chapter Three? Who is in the photo?

5. Why does Will tell Dani he needs the gun in Chapter Three? Why does Will explain The Rules to Dani?

6. What happens on the day of the picture that Dani shows to Will in Chapter Three?

7. Who was Buck to Shawn as described in Chapter Two? What does Buck give Shawn and teach him?

8. Who gets on the elevator in Chapter Three? How do Will and the new person first interact?

9. In Chapter Two, how is the man who gets onto the elevator with Will described? How does Will find out he is Buck?

10. What does Will compare his mother’s eczema to in Chapter One? And how does he turn this into wordplay talking about the grudges in the neighborhood?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Look at Will’s Random Thought No. 4 in Chapter Five, where he thinks about kids at playgrounds standing on their father’s feet and trusting him to guide them (22). How is this metaphor connected to ideas of fatherhood in the novel? What is the representation and role of fatherhood as said in Long Way Down? How is this representation specifically shaped by the community? Write an argumentative response for what you think the definition of fatherhood in the novel is and connect it to at least three textual examples.

Essay Topic 2

Compare and contrast the character of Will Holloman to Mikey Holloman. How are these characters similar or different to one another? How are their actions related? How are their words related to one another? Why does the novel set these two characters up as foils of one another? What does their mirroring suggest about the novel's structure, and eventual ending? Write a response with at least four textual examples.

Essay Topic 3

Long Way Down is intertextual with the story A Christmas Carol. Buck and other characters are decorated with gold chains, and smoke plays a role in each new scene, similar to A Christmas Carol. In A Christmas Carol, the main character is visited by a ghost of Christmas Past, Present, and Future. In Long Way Down, what do the ghosts represent for Will? Are they of the past, present, and future? What does each character represent to him? Write an argument comparing Long Way Down's ghosts to a Christmas Carol's ghosts, and why Long Way Down shows its ghosts in this way.

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