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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. In the Italicized section of the Chapter 1, in the girl's dream, what are she and Bobby running after?

2. In the non-italicized section of Chapter 2, What is Bobby's lunch date's realization that they have in the middle of the night?

3. In the non-italicized section of Chapter 3, where is Oiler going on his next dive job?

4. In the italicized section of Chapter 4, what does the girl say that photons are not?

5. In the non-italicized section of Chapter 4, what does Bobby's paternal grandfather do as a profession?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Oiler say that he regrets the most about his time in Vietnam?

2. How does the Kid feel about almost all the acts that he brings up? How does he generally end them that gives a clue as to how he feels?

3. Of the Kid's cohorts, who is the only one that the girl cares about? Why does the kid not summon her for the girl?

4. What is peculiar about this downed plane?

5. How does the Kid talk? What is the reader's impression of the Kid from the ways he talks and the language that he uses.

6. What is Oiler going to do on his dive job in Venezuela?

7. What is the job that Bobby and Red go on in Port Sulphur?

8. What happens to Bobby that ends his time racing cars?

9. In Chapter 2, why does Bobby rent a boat and sail around the little cluster of islands off the coast of Mississippi?

10. What does Bobby find in his paternal grandmother's basement after her funeral?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In what ways is this book a story about God? How is God related to the idea of duality? Or Conscious and subconscious? Is the dark side of the unconscious also God? or is God only about the light? Are heaven and Hell two halves of the same coin? What do you think the author is trying to suggest to the reader?

Essay Topic 2

Why do you think the author chooses to make Bobby's father one of the makers of the atomic bomb? How does this affect Bobby and Alicia? What is the difference in comprehensibility between a tragedy like the atomic bomb being dropped and the tragedy of losing one person in life when that person is the most deeply loved person in life?

Essay Topic 3

Why does the author include a lengthy section of conversation about math and physics? What is your experience reading this section? Does it have a connection to the rest of the story? What do you get out of reading a conversation like that, that is difficult for a lot of people to understand?

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