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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 is the name of the person that the first-person narrator keeps thinking about in the Prologue?

2. What is surprising about Colette's appearance when she opens the door to her apartment in Chapter Seven?

3. In Chapter Eight, what is it revealed that Colette has been worrying about?

4. What does the Prologue imply is the likely cause of the narrator being unprepared for her child's birth?

5. What does Francie immediately notice about Colette's apartment?

Short Essay Questions

1. In Chapter Eleven, what does Francie decide the police need to investigate further?

2. What does Colette discover on the mayor's desk, and what does she do with it?

3. What does Nell have tattooed on her arm, and what does it mean to her?

4. When Colette arrives home after her run in Chapter Eight, what do she and Charlie argue about?

5. In Chapter Eight, what memory does Nell suddenly have related to smoking?

6. In Chapter Five, why are the police being criticized for their handling of Midas's case?

7. When Colette is at the park in Chapter Eight, what secret desire is she thinking about, and what stops her from trying to obtain it?

8. What is revealed about Colette's mother in Chapter Seven?

9. When Colette takes the Midas file for the second time, what does she see that links her to the case and what does she do with it?

10. What does Winnie leave on the table at the bar, and where does it eventually end up?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

What messages about impulsiveness and risk-taking are conveyed in The Perfect Mother? Which characters make risky or impulsive decisions? Do these kinds of decisions turn out differently for "good" and "bad" characters? Do the consequences--or lack of consequences--characters face seem realistic? How would the tone of the book change if the three amateur sleuths at the center of the story faced dire consequences for their choices? Would this impact the book's entertainment value? How much of the good luck these characters experience is simply necessary given the book's genre, and how much is actually meant to convey messages about risky and impulsive behavior? Write an essay that takes and defends a position on the messages the text conveys about impulsiveness and risk-taking. Support your assertions with evidence drawn from throughout the text; be sure to cite any quoted evidence in MLA format.

Essay Topic 2

Given the thematic motifs in The Perfect Mother, why is it so appropriate that the solution to the mystery it contains rests on the reader finally understanding how identities have been obscured by assumptions? By the end of the novel, the reader is aware of having misunderstood the identities of Joshua, Token, and the first-person narrator. The novel's puzzle can only be solved when the reader fully understands each of these identities. What does this have to do with other aspects of the novel, such as the media's misrepresentation of people and the emphasis on perspective created by shifts in narrative point of view and perspective? Write an essay in which you consider how the inference gaps that structure this mystery mimic the novel's thematic concerns. Support your assertions with evidence drawn from throughout the text; be sure to cite any quoted evidence in MLA format.

Essay Topic 3

Francie's financial circumstances make her particularly susceptible to stressors like Midas's disappearance. Now that you have finished the book, though, you also know that Francie's sensitivities are what lead to the recovery of Midas. Is this simply a matter of the characterization of Francie, or is the book making a larger point about the costs and benefits of being at the center versus being at the margins? Do Nell's and Colette's relative security make them less sensitive to what is happening around them? Write an essay that considers this larger picture of whether or not the text is arguing that financial security can contribute to less awareness of others. Support your assertions with evidence drawn from throughout the text; be sure to cite any quoted evidence in MLA format.

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