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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. How long was spent reconstructing the Great Library of Alexandria in the novel?
(a) 5 years.
(b) 50 years.
(c) 10 years.
(d) 25 years.

2. In what AWFul club does Slayd meet Purity?
(a) Twise.
(b) LokUp.
(c) Mault.
(d) MØRG.

3. Which of the following is Greyson’s middle name?
(a) Archibald.
(b) Simon.
(c) Timothy.
(d) Russell.

4. With which of the following is Xenocrates’s bath scented?
(a) Lavender.
(b) Tea tree.
(c) Sage.
(d) Eucalyptus.

5. In the novel, the word “hubris” is closest in meaning to which of the following?
(a) Sloth.
(b) Wrath.
(c) Gluttony.
(d) Pride.

Short Answer Questions

1. The comment that “as much as [Greyson] loved the Thunderhead, he hated it right now” (95) offers an example of which of the following?

2. How wide a crater would have been left by the trap for Scythes Curie and Anastasia?

3. To what age does Scythe Curie suggest resetting her physical self?

4. Which section of the Separation of Scythe and State is violated by Greyson interfering in the attempt on Scythes Curie and Anastasia?

5. With what accuracy is the Thunderhead able to predict the path Scythes Curie and Anastasia take after the attempt is made on their lives and before they purpose to entrap their assailants?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Purity verify Slayd’s identity, and why does she do so?

2. What reasons does the Thunderhead give for the inefficiencies in the Office of Unsavory Affairs?

3. Why is it irony, as the Thunderhead remarks, “that with no body, the world itself becomes [its] body” (75)?

4. There is a note that Scythe Anastasia “was beginning to hate having to take the obsequious self-driving cars. Funny, but it had never bothered her before her apprenticeship. Citra Terranova had never had a burning desire to learn to drive—but Scythe Anastasia now did. Perhaps it was part of the self-determined nature of being a scythe that made her feel uncomfortable as a passive passenger in a publicar. Or maybe it was the spirit of Scythe Curie rubbing off on her” (38). What rhetorical appeal/s is/are present in the passage?

5. At first glance, the term “deadish” that appears throughout the novel might seem to be a euphemism; the “ish” suffix tends to be one that mitigates the effect or impact of the stem word to which it is attached. Why, however, is it NOT an example of euphemism?

6. What does Rowan identify as problems with the scythes’ security forces when he confronts Xenocrates in his bath?

7. Anastasia notes that the site of the Mortality Memorial is “a city underserved by the scythedom” because it “was too macabre for them” and “in very poor taste” (45). Why would scythes, whose work is in killing people, find celebrations of death macabre and in poor taste, per the novel?

8. The Thunderhead rebukes its administration for desiring more ostentatious buildings (69-70). Why, per the text, does it do so?

9. Scythe Brahms observes that “five highly developed senses could often have the semblance of a sixth” (6). To what sixth sense does Brahms refer? What purpose might its denial serve for the genre?

10. What reasons does Xenocrates rehearse for visiting his bathhouse more frequently as the year draws to a close?

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