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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. When the family car breaks down in the rain, what does Paps use to protect the brothers?

2. What does the narrator hope Paps and Ma will do after the brothers' hide from them in Chapter 10, YOU BETTER COME?

3. Why does Lina, Ma's co-worker, come to the narrator's house?

4. What is one nickname that the narrator and his two brothers call themselves?

5. How does the narrator know Paps and Ma are fighting when Paps returns home in Chapter 9, TALK TO ME?

Short Essay Questions

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

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

3. What previous incident may have led Joel to ask a pregnant woman outside a drugstore if she was tricked into having a baby?

4. How does the narrator differentiate the brothers' behavior in relation to when Ma is awake or asleep?

5. At the end of Chapter 10, NIGHT WATCH, Paps says,"We're never going to escape this...Never" (60). What is he sure the narrator's family will not escape?

6. As the brothers hid in the bathtub, Paps and Ma pretend to not know and do not immediately come to find them. What deep fears does the narrator share about this lack of attention?

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

8. Why do the narrator and Joel hide in a crawlspace when Paps returns home after being gone for many days?

9. What metaphorical significance can be determined by the fact that Ma and the narrator cannot swim and hang on to Paps in order to stay afloat?

10. Why may Ma choose to call the narrator's family's new vehicle, "Big-Dick Truck"?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In Chapter 6, US PROPER, the brothers are told about their births from Ma. Ma explains how young she was and how Paps "tricked her." At the end of the Chapter, the boys encounter a pregnant woman and ask her unorthodox questions about her own pregnancy. The woman responds that the brothers need to behave properly. Why do you think this Chapter is titled, "US PROPER?" What is the relevance of the word "US" in the Chapter title, when it may have just been called, "BEING PROPER"?

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

During Paps' new job as a late night security guard, the brothers accompany him to work throughout the night. The narrator awakens in the middle of the night and has a profound conversation with Paps about why a light is trapped in a cage across the street. How does Paps' reasoning and response present a bigger link to the story and the meaning of being trapped? After reading the entire novel, how might this conversation produce deeper insight into the narrator's feelings and questioning that is not so easily seen from the initial incident?

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