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ABOUT THE BOOK
NO SPOILERSGao Sheng is eleven years old, the oldest of five children in a Hmong family living on a hilltop in Pha Khao, a mountain village in Laos, in the spring of 1975. She spends her days doing chores, watching over her younger siblings, and secretly saving peach seeds from the tree behind her house, hoping to grow her own orchard someday. Her father is a captain in the Noble Lao Army, and for years the war between the government and the communists has felt far away, something the adults whisper about at night. Then her school closes without warning, her teacher tells the students to go home and warn their families that it is time to escape, and Gao Sheng realizes her family may have to leave everything she loves, her house, her hill, her peach trees, behind. As her parents scramble to decide where to go and how to get there, Gao Sheng has to figure out what kind of daughter, and what kind of person, she wants to be when home is no longer certain.
Free Battle of the Books questions for A Year Without Home
SPOILERSEvery one of these has the same answer, and that is the point. In a real battle the question is read aloud with a dozen other books in play, and students have a few seconds to place it. Here is what a battle might ask about A Year Without Home. Use them as a quiz, a trivia round, or BOTB practice.
Where in the book they come from
- Early in the book
In what book do neighbors say a white tin roof glows so bright it can be seen from space?
✓ Answer
A Year Without Home by V.T. Bidania
Gao Sheng's father built the family house on top of a hill in the mountains of Laos, and the whole extended family lives in it together. Standing on that hilltop is the one place where she never thinks about the war at all.
- First half
In what book is a mother taken into a police station after telling her daughter to wait two hours?
✓ Answer
A Year Without Home by V.T. Bidania
Police cars box the taxi in from all sides, and the officer lets Mom bring only the baby inside. Eleven-year-old Gao Sheng is left on a street corner with three younger children and orders to get them across the city alone if Mom does not come out.
- First half
In what book can a girl's heart "break into pieces and feel whole at the same time"?
✓ Answer
A Year Without Home by V.T. Bidania
Gao Sheng thinks this standing on the far riverbank, watching her father and uncles drop to their knees while her mother, grandmother, and aunties cry. Her family is safe and her country is gone, both in the same moment.
- Second half
In what book does a new student arrive in fancy shoes that click across the classroom floor?
✓ Answer
A Year Without Home by V.T. Bidania
Choua walks into the camp school with sparkling silver earrings and hair down to her waist, then sits right next to Gao Sheng. Within a day she has declared them best friends, which changes everything for a shy girl who lost her best friend back in Laos.
- Second half
In what book does an exploding water tank make everyone think they are being bombed?
✓ Answer
A Year Without Home by V.T. Bidania
The blast sends the whole camp running and Gao Sheng is certain the communists have found them, until a megaphone announces what really burst. The families howl with laughter in relief, and then she notices the baby is missing.
- Near the end
In what book does a girl fling her pouch of saved seeds into the night?
✓ Answer
A Year Without Home by V.T. Bidania
Losing Yia is the moment Gao Sheng finally breaks down, and she throws away the one thing she carried all the way out of Laos. It is her lowest point, and it feels like giving up on ever going back.
