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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. What does Tom Crick think the French really celebrate on Bastille Day when they mark the beginning of the French Revolution?
(a) An event that never took place.
(b) An event that was not nearly as important at the time as it is now made out to be.
(c) The beginning of the Napoleonic Empire.
(d) The power of the mob over government.

2. What is the worst thing Tom Crick can imagine?
(a) Mary stops loving him.
(b) Nuclear weapons destroy the earth.
(c) Humans forget their own history.
(d) Humans stop being curious.

3. What World War I battle was Tom's father injured in and saw his brother killed in earlier in the day?
(a) Ypres.
(b) Marne.
(c) Verdun.
(d) Somme.

4. Who is the patron saint of Gildsey?
(a) St. Julian of Norwich.
(b) St. Mary.
(c) St. Gunnhilda.
(d) St. Gertrude of the Marshes.

5. What does Tom dream that he considers telling the headmaster about?
(a) He dreams of a woman wailing in a supermarket.
(b) He dreams of Mary as she was when she was 15.
(c) He dreams of Price as the Prime Minister of Britain.
(d) He dreams of the headmaster drowning in a canal.

Short Answer Questions

1. What gives the Atkinsons the decisive advantage over the other brewers in the Gildsey area?

2. Tom Crick's wife, Mary, has been sent to a mental institution. Why?

3. Which part of London does the couple move to once they are married and Tom takes a job as a history teacher?

4. What does Freddie Parr do to Mary as revenge for setting him up to lose the competition because she knew he couldn't swim?

5. What medical condition is Tom afraid that Mary might have?

Short Essay Questions

1. In chapter 37, Tom Crick discusses the idea of terror and how it aids people in pretending they're changing the world for the better. What are some examples Tom gives from the French Revolution?

2. In chapter 2, a student called Price interrupts Tom Crick, the history teacher, to tell him what about history?

3. In chapter 50, Harry Crick is bed-ridden in Tom's and Mary's first house in Gildsey. What made him ill?

4. In chapter 5, what does Tom notice about Freddie Parr's face, and what does he conclude from it?

5. in chapter 44, Tom Crick and his wife Mary return the baby Mary stole to the Safeways store where she found it. What are Tom's fears as they approach the mother of the child and how does the mother react?

6. In chapter 28, Tom explains why he turned to history and stories as passionately as he did. Why is that?

7. In chapter 43, Tom Crick parts from Price shouting "don't let him do it!" What is he referring to and what theme that has run through the novel is this a culmination of?

8. In chapter 10, Tom Crick explains that he thinks the most important question is the question "why?" How does he use Louis XVI's fate to illustrate that point?

9. Briefly discuss how, in chapter 44, his interview with the police unravels Tom's earlier ideas about teaching the facts of history.

10. In chapter 38, Tom describes the death of his mother from the flu. What is most remarkable about it to him?

(see the answer keys)

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