The Bean Trees 

Chapter 1

• Describe Missy's mom. (pg. 7, 13, 14, 15)
  • Missy’s mom is a supportive and loving moving. She is Missy’s biggest fan.
• Where does Missy work and what does she do? How did she get the job? (pg. 5, 8, 9)
  • She worked in a hospital where she counted platelets. She got the job through her teachers wife who worked at the hospital.
• What do you think happened between Jolene and Newt?
  • I think that Newts father had been abusing him, so he decided to kill himself and attempt to kill Jolene
• What were the two promises Missy made when she drove over the Pittman line? (pg. 15-16)
  • the first promise was that she would get herself a new name, whenever she ran out of gas she would look for a road sign and that would be her name
  • the second promise was the one that she broke, she said she would drive until her car stopped running
• What special event happened in Oklahoma? (23-25)
  • A women puts a baby in her car, tells her not to go back inside into the bar, and tells her to keep the baby
• Why did she name the baby Turtle? (pg. 29-32)
  • Because as soon as Taylor picks her up she grabs onto her so tightly

Chapter 2

• After being on the bus, explain why Lou Ann wouldn't mind living a life as a pregnant lady. (pg. 40)
  • Lou Ann would not mind living life as a pregnant lady because while being pregant, on the bus, she was not sexually harassed like she had been previously. It allows her to exsist outside the limiting standards men had placed upon women.
• What part of Angle would remain with Lou Ann?
  • The memories she has with him (pg 45-46)
  • taking her shoes off
  • Angel’s Mexican heritage/ their baby together (pg. 39)
  • Internal conflict with her mother
    • She believed Mexicans were trying to take over the world like the Catholics
    • Lou Ann had decided to baptize her baby in the Catholic church, per request of Angel’s mother, and had not yet told her own mother because she saw it as irrational rather than a real religion.
• What are the pamphlets Lou Ann got from the doctor about? (38-39)
  • The pamphlets have a special diet written out in both English and Spanish. This shows the duality of Arizona: showing how Arizona belongs to both American and Mexican cultures.
• What were the two buildings Lou Ann walked by after she got off the bus? (pg. 41)
  • Jesus is Lord Used Tires
  • represents salvation
  • Fanny Heaven
  • represents the opposite: damnation
• How did Angle get the name Dusty while in the rodeo? (pg. 44)
  • it was short for Angle Dust, a type of drug
  • alludes to the addiction he had dealt with while in the rodeo
• What did Lou Ann give kids for Halloween? (pg.45)
  • Pennies because she forgot to get candy at the Lee Sing Market
• What was Lou Ann trying to save up for with pennies? (pg. 45)
  • A washer to wash her baby’s diapers

Chapter 3

• Why did Taylor decide to live in Arizona? (pg.47-48)
  • Taylor decided to live in Arizona because the clouds were “pink and fat and hilarious-looking” and their were rocks that turned pink when the sun hit them; she said it all looked too goofy to be real. She decided that because these were the best things she had seen in years, that she would live here whether her car crooked out or not.
• What happens to Talyor's car as she pulls under shelter? (pg. 50-53)
• It was full of ice inside and out, and her rear tire was flat
• Describe the two men that stop by JESUS IS LORD USED TIRES. (pg. 58)
• Roger asked for Matilda and wanted an alignment and to pick up tires for is ORV. He said ORV as if everybody would know what it meant. He waited
• The other man had on a black shirt with a white priests collar and blue jeans. He seemed “jumpy” to Taylor and had a whole family in the back of his car that looked like “Indians”
  • Taylor refers to them as “Indians” as she is ignorant. I think that he is hiding immagrants.
• Who is Sandi? What's her boy's name? Describe her. (pg. 67-69)
  • Sandi worked at the Burger Derby
  • Her boy’s name is Seattle
  • Sandi is horse obsessed, she wore tiny horse earrings and treated Taylor like she was royalty because she was from Kentucky, home of the Kentucky Derby, she believes anyone who lives in Kentucky owns or grows up around horses. She is also raising a young child on her own
• Why is Arizona so different to Taylor than home? (pg. 47-51)
  • Arizona is so different because it is a lot more extravagant than Kentucky. She describes pink fat clouds, stacked rocks that looked like roundish animals and people and turned pink in the sun. She describes the sun coming out before the rain even stopped, and the two rainbows that appeared above.
  • (pg. 51) “Arizona didn’t do anything halfway. If Arizona was a movie you would’nt believe it. You’d say it is too corny for words.”

Chapter 4

• Describe Lou Ann's Grandmother Logan. (pg. 71-73)

  • Lou Ann’s grandmother is very provincial and racist towards Angel. She brings water in a bottle so that Dwayne can be baptized properly. She is also very opposed to Arizona’s humid and dry climate.

• How does Lou Ann communicate her relationship with her husband to her mother and grandmother?

  • She doesn’t. Angel moves in while they are in town to make it seem like they are still together even though they are not.

• What is the baby's name and when was he born? (pg. 76)

  • Dwayne Ray was born on New Years Day

• When Angel came to pack his shaving stuff what else was he looking for? (pg. 85)

  • His silver belt buckle with the sheep shank on it.

• What does Angel do with the water from Tug Fork? (pg. 86)

  • He pours it out into the sink

Chapter 5

• Describe how Taylor was awakened each morning? (pg. 87)
  • She lived next to a railroad, a train came by at approximately 6:15 every morning so she used this as her alarm.
• Explain Sandi's situation? (Why did she end up with the baby?) (pg.89)
  • The father of her baby told everyone that she was schizophrenic and had picked his name out of the high school yearbook. The father of the baby got transferred to Oakland, California. Her mother made her move out, so she paid rent to live with her sister.
• Why did Taylor lose her job at the Burger Derby? (pg.88)
  • She got into an argument with the manager and threw her cap in the trash compactor
• How did Fei, Timothy, and La-Isha act? (In general and toward Taylor and Turtle) (pg. 93-94)
  • They were kind but definitely judgmental. They disapproved of Turtle having a hot dog for breakfast and it had at least four different kinds of toxins
• What similarities did Taylor and Lou Ann discover about their lives? (pg. 96)
  • Their hometowns in Kentucky were 2 counties away, they had both attended the same Bob Seger concert, and they both had a child
• How did Taylor and Lou Ann get along together when they met? (pg. 96-100)
  • They got along very very well and decided to live together
• At the end of the chapter Lou Ann tells Taylor that she wasn't sure if Taylor wanted to move in and they have a short conversation about this. What does the conversation revel about Lou Ann’s personality? (pg. 101-102)
  • It tells us that she is a very insecure person. She was worried about how she compared to Taylor.

Chapter 6

• In what ways was working for Mattie better than the job at Derby Burger? (pg. 104)
  • She gave Taylor two new tires and and showed her how to fix her ignition. She also would send Taylor and Turtle home with cabbage and peas. She paid twice as much, and did not have a ridiculous uniform that had to be dry cleaned
• What does Mattie do to Taylor to get her not to be afraid of exploding tires? (pg. 108)
  • She took a five-gallon jerry can and filled it up with water, then she threw it at Taylor and explained that the can weighed 28 pounds, which is the same weight as the amount of air you put in a tire. This made her realize that tire explosions were relative, and Mattie told Taylor if there were ever tractor tires she would take care of it.
• When Taylor went downtown, what did she buy? (pg. 109)
  • She bought Turtle two books, one being named “Old Macdonald Had an Apartment House.”
• Why was Taylor mad at Lou Ann when she came back? (pg. 113)
  • Taylor was upset becuase she came home from a hard day of work and Lou Ann was reading magazines for child-raising tips and recipes. They were like a family on a TV comercial
• Why did Taylor offer Lou Ann a beer? (pg. 114)
  • Taylor wanted to talk about something and did not want Lou Ann to be offended. She wanted Lou Ann to stop doing favors for her.

Chapter 7

• When Lou Ann said " if that had been Angel, he would've given himself 2 points for everyone he could hit," (129) what does she mean, and how does it describe Angel's character?

  • She means that Angel would have kept driving and might have even gone out of his way to hit the quails. This tells us that Angel is not empathetic whatsoever and does not care about nature

• What words did Turtle always seem to say? What does that suggest about her future? (pg. 135)

  • Turtle always seems to say words regarding vegetables. This suggests that her future might involve farming and gardening.

• When Estevan greeted Edna and Mrs. Parsons, what names did he use instead of their real names? Do you think these were "official" names for them (for the US), or just names made up so they wouldn't seem like foreigners?  (pg. 140-141)

  • Steven and Hope

• When Mrs. Parsons commented about America "jibbering and jabbering till we won't know it's America" after Estevan told her he had worked in a Chinese restaurant, how did her statement show how she really was? Lou Ann asked Edna and Mrs. Parsons if they wanted anything, Edna replied no, and stated "you children have made a delightful meal." Does she really mean children, and what does this show about her view on Taylor and Lou Ann?