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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 makes Lee think that the girl he sees in the parking lot is his daughter?

2. What is the first method Meg finds for making money?

3. How does the narrator characterize the routine Peggy gets into with her new baby?

4. Why does Peggy not want to go to a judge to get a divorce?

5. Why does Meg refuse to work as a waitress?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is Peggy’s role as faculty wife like?

2. Why does Lee’s private investigator ultimately give up his search for Peggy?

3. How does Meg pass herself and Karen off as black?

4. How does Peggy adapt to life as a mother?

5. Why does Peggy flee from Lee’s house?

6. What is Peggy’s first meeting with Lee like?

7. What is Lomax’ background?

8. What is the house like, where Lee lives?

9. What is Byrdie’s effect on his classmates in high school?

10. How does the narrator describe the construction of Stillwater Lake?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

When is Mislaid most itself? What is its characteristic passage, or moment? What makes that moment or passage the most representative of the book as a whole? Are there any places where the book seems to depart from its typical self, as if to become a different book?

Essay Topic 2

What are the elements that make Mislaid a Southern novel? How does the South appear in the novel, and what are the Southern traits of the main characters? How do the main characters relate to the South or Southern-ness? Do they embrace it? Repudiate it? Defy it? Endorse it?

Essay Topic 3

What makes Mislaid a fun book to read? What lines or scenes, in particular, are enjoyable to read, and why? How does Zink create the effects that are enjoyable? Pay attention to the language she uses, and tease out the literary devices she used to arrive at the satisfaction you found.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,041 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample