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Essay Instructions: PEACE LIKE A RIVER
Read Peace Like a River, by Leif Enger. Answer the question that applies to the chapter

Chapter One – Clay
After reading once through, explain the significance of the title for this chapter.

Chapter Two – His Separate Shadow
Who else, besides Rueben’s father, seems to be separate in some way in this chapter? Why? What could this possibly foreshadow?

Chapter Three – Beauteous are My Cakes Indeed
Rename this chapter. Explain your title choice.

Chapter Four – Your Toughened Heart
What does the speaker admonish in this chapter? To what biblical verse could this admonishment be compared? Locate what you believe to be a passage of possible foreshadowing in this chapter and write it here.

Chapter Five – Peeking at Eternity
Identify the emerging conflict in ideologies between Davy and Mr. Land. Hypothesize on why “peeking at eternity” causes Mr. Land to “plunge his hands joyfully in the sewer”.
Why do you believe that Swede can no longer “kill” Valdez? What do you suppose has changed, and /or what do you think he has come to represent?

Chapter Ten – The Substance of Things Hoped For
Why do you suppose the author includes the scene where Reuben sees old Mr. Finch? (Think about how protagonists are suppose to grow and change)

Chapter Thirteen – Something Warm
What small hints does Reuben give in this chapter that Roxanna Crawley may come to be an important person to the Land family?

Chapter Sixteen – The Throbbing Heart of News
What is the “throbbing heart of news”? How does this title pertain to Reuben?

Chapter Seventeen – The Little Man’s Country
Describe “little man’s country”. Explain your personal response to Jape Waltzer.

Chapter Nineteen – Boy Ready
Explain the significance of this title.

Chapter Twenty – The Ledger of Our Decisions
Explain your personal response to Reuben purposely leading the men away from Davy.

Chapter Twenty –two – Be Jubilant, My Feet
What exactly do you suppose Reuben is to “tell Davy”? Why?

The Novel as a Whole
Pretending that you are a book critic writing for a magazine, review Peace Like a River for your readers. Remember that novel critiques are relatively short but give the reader a good sense of what the novel is about as well as the honest, introspective opinion of the critic.

Essay Instructions: The assignment is a "literary analysis" of PEACE LIKE A RIVER by Leif Enger. (Also known as "interpreting a story" essay) We are to use specific things in the book (specific quotes) with the page number written in parentheses. We can tie the novel into a specific literary "genre"... I was thinking it's a story about family and how they "stuck together", but there are several possibilities (interpret a character psychologically, ethically or morally, or from a social perspective ? interpret the plot structure ? interpret the point of view (in terms of what the narrator can see or how the narrator represents what he sees) ? literary motif or theme (an initiation (or coming of age or rite of passage story), story about a character?s disillusionment or fall from innocence, story about family) --
THIS IS THE ASSIGNMENT: When you write an essay interpreting a story, you cannot simply tell readers, whom may have different interpretations, what you think and expect them to accept your interpretation or even to understand it fully. You need to show how you read the story. Ideally, your readers will see something new in the story after reading your essay. But even if they continue to read the story differently from the way you read it, they may still acknowledge that your interpretation reflects and imaginative, thoughtful reading of the story. ? Interpreting a story, then, is not a competition for the ?correct? interpretation. Your aim is to develop an interpretation that is insightful and interesting to readers who are already engaged in conversation with other readers about their different ways of reading the story. Readers do not require you to come up with a startling new idea, though they would be pleased if you did. Your readers will be disappointed, however, if your essay is unfocused, if they key terms in your thesis statement (WHICH NEEDS TO BE UNDERLINED) are unclear, if you do not give reasons for your interpretation or you do not support them with quotations from the story, or if your essay fails to provide the necessary cues to keep readers on track. Readers will be especially disappointed if they think you are retelling the story rather than developing your own interpretation of the story?s meaning or significance.

Essay Instructions: I need to write a cogent, compelling essay 4 pages long and in depth in persuasive, graceful prose. Formulate a clear thesis, support your opinions with concrete evidence from the text (please cite 5-6 textual examples), and observe the rules of good grammar, punctuation, and style on the following topic from the book Peace Like a River by Leif Enger:

Peace Like a River insists that miracles happen. What miracles take place in the novel? How are they made believable? What does the insistence on miracles in the novel achieve? Are readers encouraged to look at the world and their own lives in a different way? What differences does the novel suggest?