View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What question that Lewis asks in Chapter Eight makes Uncle Jonathan angry?

2. What does Lewis do after he hears Uncle Jonathan and Mrs. Zimmerman's discussion in Chapter Eight?

3. Who is the realtor for the Hanchett's, as said in Chapter Seven?

4. What does the Ace of Nitwits card in Chapter Ten look like?

5. Where is the entrance to the mansion's secret passageway, as said in Chapter Eight?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does the car in Chapter Six stop following them? What rule of magic does Uncle Jonathan say this relates to?

2. Why do Uncle Jonathan and Mrs. Zimmerman say Isaac Izard needed a clock in Chapter Eight? What else went wrong with Izard’s plan?

3. What do Uncle Jonathan, Mrs. Zimmerman, and Lewis find when they return home in Chapter Six? What do they find inside?

4. What do Uncle Jonathan and Mrs. Zimmerman do in Chapter Six to cheer Lewis up? What happens when they are out?

5. What does Lewis go to do in Chapter Nine? What does he learn there?

6. Why does Lewis feel sick in the beginning of Chapter Seven? What does he realize he has done?

7. What does Lewis do to confront the problem in Chapter Nine? What where does he go?

8. Who appears in the basement in Chapter Nine? What are they carrying?

9. How does Uncle Jonathan say in Chapter Six that Izard’s tomb was marked? What did this symbol mean?

10. How do they celebrate Christmas at the Barnavelt’s house in Chapter Eight? How does Lewis feel?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Verisimilitude is a literary term that means creating a believable world in a novel that feels as if it is its own world. How does the novel craft verisimilitude in the town of New Zebedee and Lewis’ experiences? How does it apply that verisimilitude to accepting extraordinary events such as magic? Write three pages with at least four textual examples.

Essay Topic 2

A house in literature can stand as a metaphor of a mind, and in the Gothic tradition, what is trapped inside of a house may represent what is trapped within a mind. A locked door may be a part of the brain that is locked away, a corridor may be a shortcut from one thought to another. Apply this understanding of a haunted house to the novel. What is trapped inside, how is it trapped, and whose mind, or minds, does this represent? Write three pages with at least four textual examples.

Essay Topic 3

How is suspense and fear built in the novel? Consider the structure of the events of the novel in pages, chapters, and as a whole as well as the language used in each of these events. Write three pages with at least four textual examples.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 862 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample