1. After the narrator drops Gin off at her building on the night of the incident at the beach, why does she run back outside and call after him?
(a) She wants to tell him that she loves him.
(b) She want to know if he is going to tell anyone what happened.
(c) She wants to know if he needs an umbrella.
(d) She needs to get her blanket back from him.

2. In what sense is the drowned woman also still constantly in the narrator's thoughts?
(a) He imagines that every man he sees could be her killer.
(b) He sees her as a symbol of his own recklessness.
(c) He constantly imagines her there beside Gin.
(d) He begins collecting newspaper articles about drownings.

3. What technique is evident in the phrase "feverish plucking and twanging, tom-toms, congas, and gongs" (235)?
(a) Cacophony.
(b) Double entendre.
(c) Hyperbaton.
(d) Euphony.

4. What does Gin mean when she tells the narrator that she knows the dead woman?
(a) The woman is a distant relative of Gin's.
(b) She dreams about the woman.
(c) The woman was not much older than Gin.
(d) The woman was from her neighborhood.

5. In the story's opening, what details are related to the story's epigraph?
(a) Gin's bed and their parents' cars.
(b) Light and darkness.
(c) The condition of the Rambler and the rosary.
(d) Grass, leaves, and snow.

Short Answer Questions

1. Which of the following is one of the places where the narrator and Gin go to try to resume their attempts at intimacy after the incident at the beach?

2. What characteristic of the area around the beach is conveyed with its nickname, the "Gold Coast"?

3. What kind of buildings are on the lovers' lane?

4. What happens after the night on the beach, when the narrator senses Gin growing distant while they are kissing?

5. How has the narrator and Gin's relationship changed by the end of the summer?

(see the answer key)

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