View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Rondal say is needed by the union?

2. What do Carrie and Rondal do in the middle of the night?

3. Where does Rondal agree to go?

4. Where does Rondal go?

5. What happens between Rondal and Carrie while Rondal is at the Homeplace?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Albion ask Carrie about her mood, what does he tell her and what is her response?

2. What does Carrie do after talking to Rondal, what does Albion tell her and what does she decide?

3. How are Albion and Isom killed?

4. What happens when Isom tries to arrest the gun thugs in May of 1920?

5. What happens to Rosa in Chapter 17?

6. What does Rondal talk to Carrie about and what his her response?

7. What do the women do after a black child dies?

8. What does Carrie do after Albion is killed?

9. What do Rondal and Carrie do when they reach Charleston and what does Talcott do about the union movement at that point?

10. What do the mining companies do when their team is going to play Annadel and what is Annadel's response?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss the following:

1. Compare/contrast Rowley Flint with Edgar Swift. How are they alike? How are they different? Are they sympathetic characters? Who would you most likely have as a friend? Why? Is each one believable? Why or why not.

2. Compare/contrast Rowley Flint with Karl Richter. How are they alike? How are they different? Are they sympathetic characters? Who would you most likely have as a friend? Why? Is each one believable? Why or why not.

3. Compare/contrast Mary as she seems early in the book and in her flashbacks to how Mary is by the end of the book. Is she the same? Different? Wiser? More or less daring? Is she likable? Why or why not.

Essay Topic 2

Storming Heaven is a historical novel that tells the story of struggling West Virginia coal miners in the early twentieth century, which is a story that has often been neglected by history books. This novel gives a fictional but accurate account of how the miners stood together and how business and political interests used deadly force to preserve the oppressive conditions. Discuss the following:

1. How do the interest of business and politicians coincide in Storming Heaven? Use examples from the text to support your response.

2. Do you think there are any incidences or events in present day America in which big business and politicians seem to combine their power in ways in which it might not be in the best interest of the lower economic classes? Why or why not? Use examples to support your answer.

3. There have been a number of incidences in American history where the government has used deadly force against its citizens even as recent as the 1960's and 1970's. Do you think it is possible the government would ever use force against its citizens in the present time? Why or why not?

4. The miners, after many atrocities began to meet violence with violence. Do you think this was the wrong approach? Why or why not?

5. Do you think the miners had the moral right to use violence when it was used against them? Why or why not?

Essay Topic 3

There are a number of themes in Storming Heaven. Discuss one of the following:

1. Choose two major themes and analyze them and discuss examples of where that theme appears in the text.

2. Compare and contrast two major themes in the novel to those themes found in other texts/movies with which you are familiar.

3. Other than class, which theme do you think is the major theme of the book? Discuss why and give example

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,211 words (approx. 5 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample