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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 kind of cars does Baxter Motors sell?

2. What does Keith Landry experience at the holiday gathering?

3. What does Keith Landry feel in Chapter 3, as he walks through the farmhouse?

4. What doe Keith Landry arrange at the end of Chapter 12?

5. What does Cliff Baxter force Sherry Kolarik to do?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe Keith Landry's experience at the Landry family Labor Day gathering.

2. Describe the conflict that is being brewed as Keith Landry spends more time in Spencerville--and how it seems likely to be settled.

3. What is Keith Landry invited to do at the dinner he has at the Porter household?

4. What happens when Annie confronts Cliff Baxter?

5. What are Keith Landry's feelings as we meet him?

6. What does Keith Landry ultimately do with his car?

7. Describe Annie's departure from Keith Landry's house.

8. What was Keith Landry's career before taking forced retirement?

9. What happens on the night of Keith Landry's meeting with Cliff Baxter?

10. What advice does the pastor give Keith Landry?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Why doesn't Keith Landry urge Annie to remain married, and to work within the bond she had accepted, honoring the vows she once took? Put another way, what makes Annie's marriage to Cliff Baxter so contemptible that we wish, as readers, for it to end? Would there be a virtue to Annie remaining married?

Essay Topic 2

Who is the audience for Spencerville, and what are their expectations for a novel? Do you think Spencerville satisfies this audience? Would it satisfy readers who were used to other kinds of novels? What would a romance reader, or a literary fiction reader likely think of this book?

Essay Topic 3

Having just finished his work in the Cold War, Keith Landry returns home to find a new opposition with the brutal police chief. How much does this opposition prolong the Cold War Keith Landry had been part of fighting? Compare and contrast Cliff Baxter and the Soviet Union. Is Cliff Baxter a symbol of repressive regimes?

(see the answer keys)

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