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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 Moth take from Aunt Jack without asking?

2. Where does Moth live after the accident?

3. What does Moth do very rarely even though Sani tries to coax her to do it more?

4. What does a moth egg symbolize in Part I?

5. What does Sani's hair remind Moth of?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Moth mean when she says she is living "a secondhand life" (5)?

2. Why does Moth think Aunt Jack does not tell Moth she is leaving for the summer?

3. Why does Moth say deadness does not bother her?

4. What does Moth do every morning as an offering for the ancestors?

5. What begins to lessen Moth's fixation on the terrible memories of her car accident?

6. In Part II, what is Moth's dominant emotion as school ends and the summer just begins after Aunt Jack leaves?

7. What are the most important items on Aunt Jack's list of rules?

8. What do Sani and Moth begin working on together in Part II after no one shows up at Moth's party?

9. What happened to Moth two summers before the start of the novel?

10. Why does Moth think she might not hate this coming summer as much as she has hated the past two?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

What significance does McBride attach to the name, behavioral patterns, and symbolism of "Moth" and moths in the opening pages of the novel? Write an essay explaining your answers, citing specific references to the text to help support your conclusions.

Essay Topic 2

Why do you think McBride chooses to delve into different creation stories during Moth's and Sani's road trip? How do these stories relate to the trip itself, and to what both Moth and Sani are struggling with? Write an essay explaining your answers.

Essay Topic 3

This novel features a road trip, a fairly well-trodden plot device. How does McBride both follow and depart from some of the more traditional uses of the road trip in other books you've read with similar themes centering around extended journeys? Write an essay explaining your answers, citing specific references to the text to help support your conclusions.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 650 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample