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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 does the word "rappel" most likely mean on Page 25?

2. At the start of the novel, how many boys, also brothers, are introduced?

3. Where is Lina from?

4. In the crawlspace, the narrator asks Joel, "It's just going to be like this forever?" (43). What is the narrator referring to?

5. Why is Ma worried about the brothers' bath in Chapter 10, YOU BETTER COME?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does the reader know that Ma was a naive teenager when it came to sex as explained in Chapter 6, US PROPER?

2. Why is the narrator confused when Ma asks him why he is unable to swim in Chapter 5, LAKE?

3. What kind of support does Lina provide to the narrator's family when she comes to visit?

4. At the start of Chapter 10, YOU BETTER COME, how does Paps show an expression of regret when he returns to the family's home?

5. How does Paps coerce Ma into not being so irate about about the new truck?

6. How do you know that the narrator and his brothers are ravenous for more life according to the first page of the novel?

7. Why does Ma not want the narrator to get older like his other brothers?

8. How do you know that the novel is being written in first-person?

9. How does the narrator feel when Paps and Ma discover him after the narrator nearly drowns in the lake?

10. Having the knowledge of Ma's grueling work schedule and unstable behavior, why might the narrator say after Ma awakes confused, "It was a Sunday, but no one told Ma that" (5)?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The narrator displays conflict about watching the pornographic video, his background with the notion of sexuality, and how the two are connected and also contrasted. Analyze the author's choice to intertwine these emotions that the narrator has.

Essay Topic 2

Ma takes the brothers to a church service on the narrator's birthday and shows them a painting of monks. The narrator sees them as "men of hoods with clasped hands and eyes lifted upward" (13). The narrator is especially mesmerized by these men. Later on in the novel, the narrator confesses to Ma that he wants to be a monk. Why might the reader want to become a religious man? How would becoming a monk change the trajectory of his life and assist him in escaping his own demons?

Essay Topic 3

In reference to the narrator asking Paps about the caged light in Chapter 6, NIGHT WATCH, on the ride home from Paps' work, the brothers incessantly ask Paps if he has the capability of unlocking and freeing the light. How does this interrogation from all three brothers show their concern about Paps' power? What is a possible relation to this conversation and the brothers' own futures and potential?

(see the answer keys)

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