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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. Who did Gifty have call her mother in hopes to help improve her mood?

2. What do they call Gifty’s father?

3. The two letters to God in Chapter 11 show Gifty’s fondness for whom?

4. In Chapter 8, Gifty said she never drank because she feared what?

5. In Chapter 21, Gifty finds her mother doing what in her apartment?

Short Essay Questions

1. What did Gifty feel in freshman biology class where she says she first learned “what and where the vagina truly was” (133)?

2. Why did Gifty not want to take creative writing in college even though many said it was an easy A?

3. Describe Gifty’s final thesis experiment discussed in Chapter 14.

4. Why did Gifty choose not to drink alcohol in high school?

5. What were some of the things, described in Chapter 8, that Gifty dreamed of being as a child?

6. In Chapter 6, what did Gifty witness between her brother and mother when she was a young girl?

7. How old was Gifty when she went to Ghana to stay with her aunt and why did she go?

8. In Chapter 25, when Gifty begins reading the Bible since her mother will not touch it, what does she notice that she did not notice as a child?

9. What do Gifty and Katherine have in common?

10. What does Gifty’s mother ask in Chapter 6 after she finally eats her koko, and how does Gifty respond?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Mental illness, addiction, and depression are themes in the novel. Analyze how the author uses her characters to develop these themes.

Essay Topic 2

Gifty thinks a lot of her relationship with Raymond though it was short lived and ended years ago. What does she think of and why do you think these memories stay with her?

Essay Topic 3

Analyze Gifty’s relationship to her mother and how it changed over time.

(see the answer keys)

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