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. In what country is the family of Anita’s mother?

2. Of which of the following does Samuel seek to rid himself?

3. Which of the following cakes does Leticia serve Anita?

4. In what year does Samuel visit the Holocaust Museum?

5. Which of the following does Leticia prepare to welcome Anita?

Short Essay Questions

1. How had Cruz helped Nadine’s work with immigrants?

2. Why does Selena’s fiancé take well to his profession?

3. Why is Gómez isolated in prison?

4. Why does Samuel note that stripping children from their parents is deeply American?

5. How does Anita’s father die?

6. What history does Leticia find for Samuel’s home?

7. Why does Samuel remark that Anita will never get over the trauma she has experienced?

8. Why does Selena remark Anita has been extended some leniency by the judge hearing her case?

9. Why does Leticia range widely in her pre-dinner drinks?

10. What does Leticia note as an early sign of the fall of Samuel’s grandson?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Early on, the comment is made that “the crowd’s raw, savage energy was contagious and even exhilarating,” such that a character “had to reject the impulse to transform into a monster, to destroy, burn, and shout till he had no air left in his lungs” (20). What does the comment indicate about mass action? Do the novel and experience confirm the indication? How or how not?

Essay Topic 2

Sources attest to the presence of The Wind Knows My Name on best-seller lists. Assuming that sales figures reflect popularity, what accounts for the popularity of the novel? How does it do so?

Essay Topic 3

The novel remarks that many Central and South American countries suffered massive social upheaval in the 1970s and 1980s. Why, then, does El Salvador receive focus? That is, how does the specific focus on El Salvador shape the novel, or, how would the novel differ were a different Latin American country made its focus? Explain based on the text and your own experience.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 593 words (approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample