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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 one of the affectionate gestures Colman remembers about Joss on page 45?

2. What phrase does Joss use that Colman particularly likes?

3. What does Joss tell Millie that will solve her anguish over the one thing he can not give her early in their marriage?

4. Where is the house that Millie flees to to escape the media spotlight in Part I of the book?

5. How does Colman feel about jazz music?

Short Essay Questions

1. What kinds of dreams does Millie start to have after Joss's death?

2. How was the weather very unusual on the day of Joss Moody's funeral?

3. Why is the verse from the George Gershwin song "They Can't Take That Away From Me" that Kay begins the book with so significant to Millie's life?

4. How does the doctor, doctor Krishnamurty, who records Joss's death, handle the revelation that Joss has a woman's body?

5. In Part II, why does Colman decide not to open his father's letter addressed to him to be opened after Joss died?

6. How do Millie and Joss first meet?

7. Why are throngs of people waiting outside of Millie Moody's house several days after Joss Moody's death and funeral?

8. What does Millie ask the registrar to do that means so much to her in registering Joss's death?

9. What does Joss Moody tell his son Colman when Colman asks him about Joss's own father?

10. What struck Colman the most about the attendees at his father's funeral?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

What is Colman Moody able to learn about his father - and himself - from Joss Moody's letter that Joss left for Colman to be opened after Joss's death? Write an essay explaining your answer.

Essay Topic 2

Write an essay exploring the prejudices, biases, and racist attitudes that Joss and Millie encountered when they began dating and eventually got married.

Essay Topic 3

At the end of the novel, Colman and Millie are about to meet face-to-face for the first time since Colman found out that his father Joss was born as a woman. Given all that has transpired in the novel to this point, write an essay predicting what you think may transpire during this meeting. Will Colman and his mother be able to find mutual forgiveness and forge a path towards a peaceful relationship?

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