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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 is at least half the battle Anne faces in her daily writing?

2. How else does Anne say you might you know you are done?

3. What is Anne's response when her students ask her for the best writing advice?

4. When will you know your characters, according to Anne?

5. What do we want out of important characters, such as a narrator?

Short Essay Questions

1. When Anne was writing food reviews, how did allowing herself to write bad first drafts help her?

2. What does a bad first draft provide a writer, according to Anne?

3. When Anne's students tell her they do not know where to start, she tells them to start with their childhood. How is this helpful?

4. How does Anne say perfectionism affects writing?

5. How did having a mother and father who read, and a father who was a writer, affect Anne's life?

6. How does Anne state dialogue affects a reader?

7. Readers need a sense that an important character, such as a narrator, is reliable. How does Anne suggest that writers accomplish this?

8. How did Anne accomplish a very believable gardener in her novel, when she cannot even keep a houseplant alive?

9. According to Anne, how are we able to see the underlying essence of a person?

10. Plot is the main part of your story. How does the plot best grow organically, according to Anne?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In Part 4, Publication and Other Reasons to Write, Section 1, Writing a Present, Toni Morrison is quoted as saying, "The function of freedom is to free someone else." How can writing free another person, such as the reader? In what ways does writing affect the writer?

Essay Topic 2

Short assignments and bad first drafts are the most helpful things Anne has to impart about writing. Pick either the short assignment or bad first draft, and explain the motivation, process, and outcome of the task.

Essay Topic 3

When you are stuck and cannot think of any other thing to do, but you can not leave your work alone, how does writing a letter help the writer? Who can you write the letter to? What can the letter be about? What does the writing a letter free the writer from?

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