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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 starts the panic inside the Superstition Exhibition in Chapter 44?

2. In what city were the Whittlesey crates delayed en route to New York?

3. Why does Coffey order the SWAT team out of the museum in Chapter 56?

4. How long did it take the Whittlesey crates to get from the Amazon to the Museum?

5. What first alerts Pendergast that the killer has come into the corridor with him?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Smithback do in the subbasement in Chapter 54 that turns him into something like a hero?

2. What does Smithback learn about the cargo shipped from the Amazon by Whittlesey before his disappearance in Chapter 27? Why is this significant?

3. How do Margo and Pendergast lure the creature to them a second time? What is Margo's role in this?

4. Why does Coffey instruct Bailey to take command of D'Agosta's group in Chapter 49?

5. Who directs D'Agosta's party out of the Hall of the Heavens? Which members of the group refuse to go?

6. Who is Montague and what happened to him?

7. What does the extrapolator program say about the DNA taken from the claw that was found inside the chest of one of the museum killer's victims?

8. What happens to the lights in the museum? What other damage does this cause?

9. What epiphany does Margo have in Chapter 37 that makes her decide to run the indigenous plants from the Whittlesey crates packing material through the extrapolator program?

10. What happens when the creature comes into Dr. Wright's office in Chapter 56?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Why do Pendergast and Margo lure the creature to them? How do they hope to kill it? Why does Pendergast force Margo to hold the flashlight? What does light do to the creature? How does Pendergast know this? What is Margo's role in the killing of the creature? Why are the first few shots against the creature unsuccessful? How does Pendergast finally kill the creature? Why did no one think of this sooner? Why is Frock unable to autopsy the creature? What might Frock have found if he had?

Essay Topic 2

There is a large amount of competition in the academic world. Discuss the competition seen in this novel. What kind of competition is involved? Who competes against who? What does Dr. Frock have to say about the competition he finds himself in? Is Margo competing with someone in this novel? If so, in what way and for what reason? What would the academic world be like without competition? How does this competition form and destroy reputations? How important is this competition to the careers of academicians?

Essay Topic 3

Discuss the Museum of Natural History. How true to the real museum were the writers of this novel? Discuss what real visitors to the Museum of Natural History might hope to see. How do the real exhibits of the museum compare to the fictional exhibit discussed in this novel? Why did the writers chose to set their novel in such a setting? How does the setting of this novel affect the overall plot of the novel? How might the novel have been different if it were set somewhere else?

(see the answer keys)

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