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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. During the war, when the alarms go off because of the air raids, where does the family hide?

2. After the incident with the rose bushes, the boy stays in his room for more than a day without what?

3. What does the boy try to do after his talk with Sergeant Burke in Chapter 3?

4. What happens that lets the boy know his father isn't upset anymore about the rose bushes?

5. Where does Tony McIlhenny disappear to?

Short Essay Questions

1. What memory does the boy have of an interaction between him and Crazy Joe?

2. Describe the narrator.

3. What does the boy's grandfather tell him right before he dies?

4. What strong religious beliefs of his community does the boy share in the beginning of Chapter 1?

5. What happens to Larry McLaughlin?

6. How can we see in Chapter 2 that the belief in the supernatural is a powerful force in Northern Ireland during this time?

7. Why does the boy try to run away in Chapter 3?

8. What local belief surrounds the Field of the Disappeared?

9. Describe the boy's relationship with his mother.

10. Why is the boy uncomfortable with the sympathy he feels for the police after Rory Hannaway's death?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

If you were the boy narrator, would you have kept the information you found out about Eddie's death a secret? The boy narrator does not reveal to his mother what he knows; would you have done the same? What might have changed if the boy had told his mother what he knew?

Essay Topic 2

Would it have been better if the mystery of Eddie's death was revealed earlier in the novel? How does the slowly unfolding mystery add to the boy narrator's character development? How does it shape him to become the man he grows up to be?

Essay Topic 3

Compare and contrast Aunt Katie and the boy's mother.

1.) Why does the boy's mother react negatively toward Katie?

2.) Compare and contrast the women's behavior toward the boy narrator.

3.) Ultimately, they both experience the loss of the same man. How does it affect each of them?

(see the answer keys)

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