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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 Fabiola tell the cousins in Chapter 27 about her mother?

2. Who attacks Fabiola in Chapter 20?

3. What happens at the beginning of Chapter 19?

4. What does Kasim give Fabiola in Chapter 20?

5. What does Fabiola do with Tonesha in Chapter 20?

Short Essay Questions

1. In "Kasim's Story," how does Kasim say Dray and Q have been for him and his mother?

2. What does Fabiola prepare in Chapter 23? How does she change it from how it is supposed to be?

3. In Chapter 31 where does Fabiola say she was when the Haiti earthquake hit? How does she relate this to when she opens her eyes in the present?

4. What does Fabiola dream in Chapter 21? Why does she dream this?

5. What do they see when they arrive back home in Chapter 30? What does Fabiola do?

6. In Chapter 32, what does the Francois family do with 8800 American Street? What do they drive away to do?

7. Why does Donna say she is aggressive towards Imani in Chapter 17? What does Fabiola realize about the sisters?

8. In Chapter 31, what has happened to Dray? How is Bad Leg related to this?

9. What do Kasim and Fabiola do in Chapter 28 at Kasim's house? What does Fabiola tell Kasim at the end of the Chapter?

10. What does Fabiola find out about her cousins in Chapter 21? Why have they done this?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The crossroads of American Street and Joy Road are the intersection of 8800 American Street. In the beginning of the novel, Fabiola realizes she must choose between either street for her future (112). What does she eventually choose? How does her choice affect the Francois family and herself? What influences her to make her decision?

Finally, consider what road the family drives down at the end to pick up her mother. What does this represent about the events of the novel and Fabiola's choice?

Essay Topic 2

Fabiola says she becomes American in the novel with everything the Bees show her. How is this relationship of changing between her and the family reciprocal? How does Fabiola's arrival in the family change their lives, thoughts, and actions? What is the novel showing by this about how relationships between family works?

Essay Topic 3

Kasim's name literally means "divided among many" (36). How does the meaning of his name come to play out in the novel? How does his name show how he is connected to the other characters? Write a response to his character and how he is connected to others.

Then connect his death and how the novel treats his death to the larger pattern of police shootings towards black and brown young men in American. How is the novel tying Kasim to the larger social picture? Why, through this analysis, is it Kasim who is killed?

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