The Girl Who Fell From the Sky
From its opening lines – “ ‘You my lucky piece,’ Grandma says.... Her hand is wrapped around mine” – Heidi W. Durrow pulls us into her first novel, a moving story encircling us as firmly as that protective grandmotherly grip.
When we meet Rachel Morse, the daughter of an African-American GI and a Danish woman, she is just moving into the Portland, Oregon., home of her strong-minded paternal grandmother and her warm, classy Aunt Loretta. We soon learn that Rachel has survived a fall from a nine-story apartment building in which her mother, brother, and baby sister all died. Three months earlier, Rachel’s mother had left her alcoholic husband in Germany, following her “orange-haired” lover to Chicago. But Nella hadn’t been prepared for boyfriend’s drinking and racism, or for the looks and questions she gets as the mother of three brown children.
Rachel’s “new-girl feeling” in her grandmother’s home goes beyond her recent tragedy. Having grown up with a Scandinavian mother in the more colorblind society of an overseas Army base, this is her first time in a mostly black community. Her light-brown skin, “fuzzy” hair, and blue eyes raise questions about her racial identity that are entirely new and puzzling to her.
Starting sixth grade in her new school, Rachel notes, “There are fifteen black people in the class and seven white people. And there’s me. There’s another girl who sits in the back. Her name is Carmen LaGuardia, and she has hair like mine, my same color skin, and she counts as black. I don’t understand how, but she seems to know.” Several years later, in high school, her status remains uncertain. “They call me an Oreo. I don’t want to be white. Sometimes I want to go back to being what I was. I want to be nothing.”
Winner of the Bellwether Prize, created by Barbara Kingsolver to celebrate fiction that addresses issues of social injustice, “The Girl Who Fell From the Sky” comes at a time when bi-racial and multicultural identity – so markedly represented by President Obama – is especially topical.
But set in the 1980s and focusing on one unusually sympathetic girl overcoming family tragedy and feeling her way through racial tensions, Durrow’s novel surpasses topicality.
Like Rachel, Durrow is the light-brown-skinned, blue-eyed daughter of a Danish mother and an African-American father enlisted in the Air Force. With degrees from Stanford, Columbia Journalism School, and Yale Law School, it’s no wonder she gives her heroine discipline and brains.
Rachel’s life, however, is clearly not Durrow’s. No, there’s alcohol and drug addiction; deaths by fire, trauma, and infection. There are mothers who lose their children, and a saintly drug counselor who loses his beloved girl-friend. Through it all, what makes Durrow’s novel soar is her masterful sense of voice, her assured, delicate handling of complex racial issues – and her heart.
After hearing the blues music for the first time, Rachel feels what her mother called hyggeligt – “something like comfort and home and love all rolled into one.” She wonders what might have happened if her mother had known about such soulful music, “that sometimes there’s a way to take the sadness and turn it into a beautiful song.”
This, of course, is precisely what Durrow has done in this powerful book: taken sadness and turned it into a beautiful song.
60. What should be the direct cause of Rachel coming to Portland, Oregon?
A. Her mother left her alcoholic father.
B. A deadly tragedy happened to her family.
C. Her grandmother wants her to come and stay with her.
D. There was too much racism where she used to live with her mother.
61. Durrow’s life is different from Rachel’s in that _____________.
A. Durrow has to struggle through her life, depending on herself.
B. Durrow is troubled in her life by racism, living in a poor neighborhood.
C. Durrow has come through life much easier, with a better family background.
D. There’s alcohol and drug addiction in Durrow’s suffering-laden neighborhood.
62. Why does the writer of the book review mention President Obama in this writing?
A. To show the progress in America’s black community.
B. To highlight the racial harmony in the United States.
C. To indicate Obama’s influence in helping Durrow win the Bellwether Prize.
D. To remind readers of the background when the novel was written and won the Bellwether Prize.
63. The blues music Rachel hears is, deep at the bottom of her heart, most suggestive of ______.
A. bravery          B. hope           C. sadness         D. beauty

The Girl Who Fell From the Sky

From its opening lines – “ ‘You my lucky piece,’ Grandma says.... Her hand is wrapped around mine” – Heidi W. Durrow pulls us into her first novel, a moving story encircling us as firmly as that protective grandmotherly grip.

When we meet Rachel Morse, the daughter of an African-American GI and a Danish woman, she is just moving into the Portland, Oregon., home of her strong-minded paternal grandmother and her warm, classy Aunt Loretta. We soon learn that Rachel has survived a fall from a nine-story apartment building in which her mother, brother, and baby sister all died. Three months earlier, Rachel’s mother had left her alcoholic husband in Germany, following her “orange-haired” lover to Chicago. But Nella hadn’t been prepared for boyfriend’s drinking and racism, or for the looks and questions she gets as the mother of three brown children.

Rachel’s “new-girl feeling” in her grandmother’s home goes beyond her recent tragedy. Having grown up with a Scandinavian mother in the more colorblind society of an overseas Army base, this is her first time in a mostly black community. Her light-brown skin, “fuzzy” hair, and blue eyes raise questions about her racial identity that are entirely new and puzzling to her.

Starting sixth grade in her new school, Rachel notes, “There are fifteen black people in the class and seven white people. And there’s me. There’s another girl who sits in the back. Her name is Carmen LaGuardia, and she has hair like mine, my same color skin, and she counts as black. I don’t understand how, but she seems to know.” Several years later, in high school, her status remains uncertain. “They call me an Oreo. I don’t want to be white. Sometimes I want to go back to being what I was. I want to be nothing.”

Winner of the Bellwether Prize, created by Barbara Kingsolver to celebrate fiction that addresses issues of social injustice, “The Girl Who Fell From the Sky” comes at a time when bi-racial and multicultural identity – so markedly represented by President Obama – is especially topical.

But set in the 1980s and focusing on one unusually sympathetic girl overcoming family tragedy and feeling her way through racial tensions, Durrow’s novel surpasses topicality.

Like Rachel, Durrow is the light-brown-skinned, blue-eyed daughter of a Danish mother and an African-American father enlisted in the Air Force. With degrees from Stanford, Columbia Journalism School, and Yale Law School, it’s no wonder she gives her heroine discipline and brains.

Rachel’s life, however, is clearly not Durrow’s. No, there’s alcohol and drug addiction; deaths by fire, trauma, and infection. There are mothers who lose their children, and a saintly drug counselor who loses his beloved girl-friend. Through it all, what makes Durrow’s novel soar is her masterful sense of voice, her assured, delicate handling of complex racial issues – and her heart.

After hearing the blues music for the first time, Rachel feels what her mother called hyggeligt – “something like comfort and home and love all rolled into one.” She wonders what might have happened if her mother had known about such soulful music, “that sometimes there’s a way to take the sadness and turn it into a beautiful song.”

This, of course, is precisely what Durrow has done in this powerful book: taken sadness and turned it into a beautiful song.

1.What should be the direct cause of Rachel coming to Portland, Oregon?

  A. Her mother left her alcoholic father.

  B. A deadly tragedy happened to her family.

  C. Her grandmother wants her to come and stay with her.

  D. There was too much racism where she used to live with her mother.

2.Durrow’s life is different from Rachel’s in that _____________.

  A. Durrow has to struggle through her life, depending on herself.

  B. Durrow is troubled in her life by racism, living in a poor neighborhood.

  C. Durrow has come through life much easier, with a better family background.

  D. There’s alcohol and drug addiction in Durrow’s suffering-laden neighborhood.

3.Why does the writer of the book review mention President Obama in this writing?

  A. To show the progress in America’s black community.

  B. To highlight the racial harmony in the United States.

  C. To indicate Obama’s influence in helping Durrow win the Bellwether Prize.

  D. To remind readers of the background when the novel was written and won the Bellwether Prize.

4.The blues music Rachel hears is, deep at the bottom of her heart, most suggestive of ______.

  A. bravery          B. hope           C. sadness         D. beauty

The Girl Who Fell From the Sky

From its opening lines – “ ‘You my lucky piece,’ Grandma says.... Her hand is wrapped around mine” – Heidi W. Durrow pulls us into her first novel, a moving story encircling us as firmly as that protective grandmotherly grip.

When we meet Rachel Morse, the daughter of an African-American GI and a Danish woman, she is just moving into the Portland, Oregon., home of her strong-minded paternal grandmother and her warm, classy Aunt Loretta. We soon learn that Rachel has survived a fall from a nine-story apartment building in which her mother, brother, and baby sister all died. Three months earlier, Rachel’s mother had left her alcoholic husband in Germany, following her “orange-haired” lover to Chicago. But Nella hadn’t been prepared for boyfriend’s drinking and racism, or for the looks and questions she gets as the mother of three brown children.

Rachel’s “new-girl feeling” in her grandmother’s home goes beyond her recent tragedy. Having grown up with a Scandinavian mother in the more colorblind society of an overseas Army base, this is her first time in a mostly black community. Her light-brown skin, “fuzzy” hair, and blue eyes raise questions about her racial identity that are entirely new and puzzling to her.

Starting sixth grade in her new school, Rachel notes, “There are fifteen black people in the class and seven white people. And there’s me. There’s another girl who sits in the back. Her name is Carmen LaGuardia, and she has hair like mine, my same color skin, and she counts as black. I don’t understand how, but she seems to know.” Several years later, in high school, her status remains uncertain. “They call me an Oreo. I don’t want to be white. Sometimes I want to go back to being what I was. I want to be nothing.”

Winner of the Bellwether Prize, created by Barbara Kingsolver to celebrate fiction that addresses issues of social injustice, “The Girl Who Fell From the Sky” comes at a time when bi-racial and multicultural identity – so markedly represented by President Obama – is especially topical.

But set in the 1980s and focusing on one unusually sympathetic girl overcoming family tragedy and feeling her way through racial tensions, Durrow’s novel surpasses topicality.

Like Rachel, Durrow is the light-brown-skinned, blue-eyed daughter of a Danish mother and an African-American father enlisted in the Air Force. With degrees from Stanford, Columbia Journalism School, and Yale Law School, it’s no wonder she gives her heroine discipline and brains.

Rachel’s life, however, is clearly not Durrow’s. No, there’s alcohol and drug addiction; deaths by fire, trauma, and infection. There are mothers who lose their children, and a saintly drug counselor who loses his beloved girl-friend. Through it all, what makes Durrow’s novel soar is her masterful sense of voice, her assured, delicate handling of complex racial issues – and her heart.

After hearing the blues music for the first time, Rachel feels what her mother called hyggeligt – “something like comfort and home and love all rolled into one.” She wonders what might have happened if her mother had known about such soulful music, “that sometimes there’s a way to take the sadness and turn it into a beautiful song.”

This, of course, is precisely what Durrow has done in this powerful book: taken sadness and turned it into a beautiful song.

60. What should be the direct cause of Rachel coming to Portland, Oregon?

  A. Her mother left her alcoholic father.

  B. A deadly tragedy happened to her family.

  C. Her grandmother wants her to come and stay with her.

  D. There was too much racism where she used to live with her mother.

61. Durrow’s life is different from Rachel’s in that _____________.

  A. Durrow has to struggle through her life, depending on herself.

  B. Durrow is troubled in her life by racism, living in a poor neighborhood.

  C. Durrow has come through life much easier, with a better family background.

  D. There’s alcohol and drug addiction in Durrow’s suffering-laden neighborhood.

62. Why does the writer of the book review mention President Obama in this writing?

  A. To show the progress in America’s black community.

  B. To highlight the racial harmony in the United States.

  C. To indicate Obama’s influence in helping Durrow win the Bellwether Prize.

  D. To remind readers of the background when the novel was written and won the Bellwether Prize.

63. The blues music Rachel hears is, deep at the bottom of her heart, most suggestive of ______.

  A. bravery          B. hope           C. sadness         D. beauty

The Girl Who Fell From the Sky

From its opening lines – “ ‘You my lucky piece,’ Grandma says.... Her hand is wrapped around mine” – Heidi W. Durrow pulls us into her first novel, a moving story encircling us as firmly as that protective grandmotherly grip.

When we meet Rachel Morse, the daughter of an African-American GI and a Danish woman, she is just moving into the Portland, Oregon., home of her strong-minded paternal grandmother and her warm, classy Aunt Loretta. We soon learn that Rachel has survived a fall from a nine-story apartment building in which her mother, brother, and baby sister all died. Three months earlier, Rachel’s mother had left her alcoholic husband in Germany, following her “orange-haired” lover to Chicago. But Nella hadn’t been prepared for boyfriend’s drinking and racism, or for the looks and questions she gets as the mother of three brown children.

Rachel’s “new-girl feeling” in her grandmother’s home goes beyond her recent tragedy. Having grown up with a Scandinavian mother in the more colorblind society of an overseas Army base, this is her first time in a mostly black community. Her light-brown skin, “fuzzy” hair, and blue eyes raise questions about her racial identity that are entirely new and puzzling to her.

Starting sixth grade in her new school, Rachel notes, “There are fifteen black people in the class and seven white people. And there’s me. There’s another girl who sits in the back. Her name is Carmen LaGuardia, and she has hair like mine, my same color skin, and she counts as black. I don’t understand how, but she seems to know.” Several years later, in high school, her status remains uncertain. “They call me an Oreo. I don’t want to be white. Sometimes I want to go back to being what I was. I want to be nothing.”

Winner of the Bellwether Prize, created by Barbara Kingsolver to celebrate fiction that addresses issues of social injustice, “The Girl Who Fell From the Sky” comes at a time when bi-racial and multicultural identity – so markedly represented by President Obama – is especially topical.

But set in the 1980s and focusing on one unusually sympathetic girl overcoming family tragedy and feeling her way through racial tensions, Durrow’s novel surpasses topicality.

Like Rachel, Durrow is the light-brown-skinned, blue-eyed daughter of a Danish mother and an African-American father enlisted in the Air Force. With degrees from Stanford, Columbia Journalism School, and Yale Law School, it’s no wonder she gives her heroine discipline and brains.

Rachel’s life, however, is clearly not Durrow’s. No, there’s alcohol and drug addiction; deaths by fire, trauma, and infection. There are mothers who lose their children, and a saintly drug counselor who loses his beloved girl-friend. Through it all, what makes Durrow’s novel soar is her masterful sense of voice, her assured, delicate handling of complex racial issues – and her heart.

After hearing the blues music for the first time, Rachel feels what her mother called hyggeligt – “something like comfort and home and love all rolled into one.” She wonders what might have happened if her mother had known about such soulful music, “that sometimes there’s a way to take the sadness and turn it into a beautiful song.”

This, of course, is precisely what Durrow has done in this powerful book: taken sadness and turned it into a beautiful song.

60. What should be the direct cause of Rachel coming to Portland, Oregon?

  A. Her mother left her alcoholic father.

  B. A deadly tragedy happened to her family.

  C. Her grandmother wants her to come and stay with her.

  D. There was too much racism where she used to live with her mother.

61. Durrow’s life is different from Rachel’s in that _____________.

  A. Durrow has to struggle through her life, depending on herself.

  B. Durrow is troubled in her life by racism, living in a poor neighborhood.

  C. Durrow has come through life much easier, with a better family background.

  D. There’s alcohol and drug addiction in Durrow’s suffering-laden neighborhood.

62. Why does the writer of the book review mention President Obama in this writing?

  A. To show the progress in America’s black community.

  B. To highlight the racial harmony in the United States.

  C. To indicate Obama’s influence in helping Durrow win the Bellwether Prize.

  D. To remind readers of the background when the novel was written and won the Bellwether Prize.

63. The blues music Rachel hears is, deep at the bottom of her heart, most suggestive of ______.

  A. bravery          B. hope           C. sadness         D. beauty

下面为五封《Crazy English》杂志的读者来信片段。请从以下选项（A、B、C、D、E和F）中，为每封来信选取最佳的回信。选项有一项是多余项。
【小题1】I am a reader of CR. Recently I found students translate some articles of CR. I appreciate your offering an opportunity to us beginners to practise using English. So I want to ask how they can obtain these articles and translate them for you, and what qualities you require. Thank you.
【小题2】I love your Crazy English Reader magazine! It provides valuable data for work in our English teaching. My wife and I are teaching Conversational English so I’ve been giving you a bit of a plug at our middle school. I told the students to “get a copy”. It’s good stuff! Fantastic!
【小题3】I’m one of Yao’s fans from Guangzhou. I have read some articles about Yao Ming in No. 7 Crazy English Reader. I want to know his correspondence address and the official website. Could you please tell me? Thank you very much indeed.
【小题4】First of all, I must say thank you very much to all the CR Reader editors who gave us a really good English magazine. Secondly, I want to give you a piece of advice. In each passage, you gave us some new words with their Chinese translation. However, as far as my knowledge, I think you should give us not only the Chinese meaning but also the English meaning so as to know the words more accurately.
【小题5】I’m an editor of the English Monthly of our school. I have a question, that is, how to say the position of the paper e.g. , 编辑; 责任编辑and so on. I hope you can help me to tell me the word in English. The more the better. Thank you so much! I love the book very much. Now I do this work. I need to study more information about this work. If you have time, please email me. Thank you.