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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What is the rhetorical purpose of the anaphora in the narrator's description of the Gold Coast residents having sex?
(a) It highlights the comic understatement of the narrator's response to the situation.
(b) It creates increasing tension as the list continues.
(c) It stresses the similarities between the narrator and these strangers.
(d) It forms an ironic contrast with the story's opening.

2. What does the narrator compare the dead woman's hair to?
(a) A horse's tail.
(b) Leaves.
(c) Seaweed.
(d) A wig.

3. After the narrator drops Gin off at her building on the night of the incident at the beach, why does she run back outside and call after him?
(a) She needs to get her blanket back from him.
(b) She want to know if he is going to tell anyone what happened.
(c) She wants to know if he needs an umbrella.
(d) She wants to tell him that she loves him.

4. How has the narrator and Gin's relationship changed by the end of the summer?
(a) Gin is not comfortable being alone with the narrator.
(b) The narrator has begun to notice other girls in his neighborhood.
(c) Gin cries whenever the narrator tries to kiss her.
(d) They argue constantly about trivial things.

5. What does the narrator see on the street when he is leaving Gin's building on the night of the beach incident?
(a) Beach sand.
(b) A condom.
(c) Gin's blanket.
(d) His underwear.

6. What technique is employed in the phrase "and justice for all" (234)?
(a) Verbal irony.
(b) Metaphor.
(c) Allusion.
(d) Litotes.

7. What is the title of the poem used as an epigraph for this story?
(a) "In Darkness and in Light."
(b) "We Did It."
(c) "The Mirror."
(d) "Water."

8. What is the narrator's tone when he recalls, "I was trying to calm your terror with reassuring phrases such as 'Holy shit! I don’t fucking believe this!'” (236)?
(a) Fatalistic.
(b) Bemused.
(c) Ironic.
(d) Acerbic.

9. What characteristic of the area around the beach is conveyed with its nickname, the "Gold Coast"?
(a) It is similar to the Mediterranean.
(b) It is beautiful.
(c) It is expensive.
(d) It is full of opportunity.

10. In the light from the squad cars and flashlights, what does the narrator see on the beach as the other couples are running away?
(a) A dead body.
(b) Garbage.
(c) The condom.
(d) Dead fish.

11. Which of the following is one of the places where the narrator and Gin go to try to resume their attempts at intimacy after the incident at the beach?
(a) Gin's grandmother's house.
(b) The balcony of the Clark Theater.
(c) The narrator's best friend's house.
(d) A party in the outer suburbs.

12. In the story's opening, what details are related to the passage of time?
(a) Gin's bed and their parents' cars.
(b) Light and darkness.
(c) Grass, leaves, and snow.
(d) The condition of the Rambler and the rosary.

13. To what British author does the narrator ironically compare himself near the end of the story?
(a) H. G. Wells.
(b) Rudyard Kipling.
(c) D. H. Lawrence.
(d) James Joyce.

14. What is the first priority of the ambulance attendant when he arrives?
(a) To try to give the woman CPR.
(b) To demand that the woman be covered up.
(c) To ask whether Gin and the narrator know the woman's name.
(d) To see if the baby is also deceased.

15. What technique is used in the sentence "On my fingers your slick scent mixed with the coconut musk of the suntan lotion we’d repeatedly smeared over each other's bodies" (234) ?
(a) Allusion.
(b) Imagery.
(c) Metonymy.
(d) Personification.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does the narrator speculate that the lightening across the water might be doing?

2. While he is on the beach, what does the narrator imagine the couples in the high-rises around them are wearing?

3. What is the description of the condom springing from the narrator's fingers "like a spring from a clock" (235) meant to convey?

4. To what does the narrator compare Gin's mother's rosary?

5. In the story's opening, what details are related to the characters' social circumstances?

(see the answer keys)

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