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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 item in Caroline's new bedroom does she remember having when she was younger?

2. What does Father suggest they do once he has found the oilskin holder?

3. When Caroline asks Father what animal he would be if he could, what is his response?

4. On page 3, what does Father tell Caroline about the adult video store?

5. What is the man doing when he spots Caroline in the lookout?

Short Essay Questions

1. What surprises the child welfare workers about Caroline's physical and mental condition?

2. What happens when Caroline tries to get to sleep on the first night in the house on the farm, and what is her solution?

3. Describe the place where Caroline and Father have been sleeping for a while by the end of Part Four.

4. What privileges has Caroline earned as she has gotten older?

5. What comparison does Father make in the question he asks the officers who are driving him and Caroline to the farm?

6. When they return to the park, what does Father find in the hollow in the crook of the tree, and what do he and Caroline do with it?

7. What is Caroline eager to tell Father once they are alone in Part Three, and how does he respond?

8. What arrives in the yellow truck, and what is Father's response?

9. Who is "Vincent," and why does Caroline object to Father working with him?

10. What kind of psychological test does Jean Bauer run with the pictures?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an essay that examines the book's messages about family. Caroline was taken from one family by Father in an attempt to build himself a family. While she lives with Father, Caroline meets the Skeleton Family and Susan and Paul. And, by the end of the book, Caroline is thinking ahead to either having children of her own or recruiting a younger girl to recreate the kind of family she had with Father. Consider all of these elements as you make and defend a claim about what My Abandonment is saying about what constitutes family and what the purpose of family is.

Essay Topic 2

Write an essay that analyzes the life that Caroline has built for herself at the end of My Abandonment. What does this life represent, thematically, when you consider My Abandonment as a coming-of-age novel? Offer textual support to defend your claims.

Essay Topic 3

Some readers have been disappointed by the book's ending. They would rather see Caroline reunite with her family in the end of the book and live a "normal" life. Write an essay in which you explore how this would impact the book's meaning and use textual evidence to defend a position about whether Peter Rock's ending is or is not successful.

(see the answer keys)

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