100 pages • 3 hours read
Karen HesseA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
This section summarizes Poem 29: “Hope in a Drizzle,” Poem 30, “Dionne Quintuplets,” and Poem 31: “Wild Boy of the Road.”
It rains a slow drizzle that adds up to a quarter inch, giving some much-needed water to the seeds and plants. Ma enjoys the drizzle by standing naked outside letting the rain wash the dust down her pregnant body: “My dazzling Ma, round and ripe and striped / like a melon” (56). Ma cries when she hears of a Canadian woman’s quintuplets. She gives biscuits to a young man traveling to California. He offers to work for the food, and when he and Daddy come in from the fields, he also accepts a haircut and fresh clothing. When he leaves, Billie Jo dreams of walking away to a somewhere green and full of life.
This section summarizes Poem 32: “The Accident,” Poem 33: “Burns,” Poem 34: “Nightmares,” Poem 35: “A Tent of Pain,” Poem 36: “A Night of Drinking,” and Poem 37: “Devoured.”
Billie Jo reveals a terrible accident in July. Daddy placed a pail of kerosene by the stove; Ma assumed it was water and poured it into the coffee-making pot on the lit stove. The flame jumped up to ignite the whole pail, and Ma ran out for Daddy.
By Karen Hesse
5th-6th Grade Historical Fiction
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Brothers & Sisters
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Coping with Death
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Forgiveness
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Guilt
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Mothers
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