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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 name is no longer given to dogs at the shelter in "A Full Service Shelter"?

2. How do the narrator of "A Full Service Shelter" and others close bite wounds or gashes they receive while caring for the dogs?

3. How long has Mrs. Greed cheated on her husband?

4. In "Fort Bedd," what does the narrator think about when things go wrong?

5. In "The Orphan Lamb," where does the carver wipe the blood?

Short Essay Questions

1. In "Greed," why does the narrator pay two teens?

2. What do the dogs know about the narrator and other volunteers regarding food?

3. Why does the narrator worry in "I Stay with Syd"?

4. In what way is the story of the lamb a story of seduction?

5. In "The Chicane," what does the narrator say about going to a film?

6. Why did Lauryn try to commit suicide in Madrid, and why did she survive?

7. How did Lauryn and Macario spend the summer they were married?

8. What does the narrator want to tell her aunt Lauryn, even though she is gone?

9. What tape did Macario receive after Lauryn died?

10. At the beginning of "I Stay with Syd," what does the narrator say about Syd's married man?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The stories “Fort Bedd” and “Four Calls in the Last Half Hour” reveal different ways of dealing with intimacy and loneliness. How do characters deal with intimacy and loneliness in the two stories? What do the stories reveal about different ways of dealing with intimacy and loneliness?

Essay Topic 2

In “The Second Seating,” friends meet to remember a friend who has died. Who is the friend who has died? What last wishes did he have that he wanted his wife and his friends to carry out? What is communicated about last wishes and memorials through his instructions?

Essay Topic 3

Foreshadowing in literature hints at what will happen in a story. What instances of foreshadowing are there in “Cloudland”? What does foreshadowing reveal? How does the author use foreshadowing and how does it affect plot?

(see the answer keys)

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