BookBright
ABOUT THE BOOK
NO SPOILERSNico, an aspiring filmmaker from New York, feels like a failure after LaGuardia, the arts high school of his dreams, puts him on its wait list. While his parents go through a trial separation, he flies alone to Puerto Rico to spend the summer in Quebradillas with his booming-voiced grandmother, Abuela Luz, and his cousins, loud Kira and quiet Nessi. Nico has panic attacks, and ever since a hurricane he lived through as a little boy, he has feared strong wind. On the plane he sees a strange girl age into the "wind witch" from his nightmares. He plans to make a video essay about Puerto Rico for a famous director's contest. Then, in a cave on a farm, the cousins come face to face with a huge winged creature with red eyes. Nessi calls it the chupacabra, and the girls' uncle calls it the shadowbeast. Nico decides to make his film about the creature instead, but soon strangers are following the cousins, and Abuela seems to know far more than she will say.
Free Battle of the Books questions for The Island of Forgotten Gods
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 The Island of Forgotten Gods. 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 is a cave room compared to a famous New York train station?
✓ Answer
The Island of Forgotten Gods by Victor Piñeiro
Nessi leads her cousins into a hole hidden by bushes at the edge of Abuelo Tito's farm, and the passage opens into an enormous dome the size and shape of Grand Central Station. Their flashlights uncover a dozen or more Taíno paintings of faces, frogs, and other symbols on its walls.
- First half
In what book does a grandmother sing so loudly in the car that other drivers swerve?
✓ Answer
The Island of Forgotten Gods by Victor Piñeiro
On the long drive to San Juan, Abuela belts out a famous Puerto Rican song like a two-hundred-pound bullfrog while El Ratoncito drives. Nico loves that she doesn't care at all what anyone else thinks.
- First half
In what book do kids climb a cemetery fence where a big angel statue blocks a man's view?
✓ Answer
The Island of Forgotten Gods by Victor Piñeiro
Nessi realizes the same man has been following them since the day before, so she leads her cousins to a spot on the fence he can't see. He looks up just as they go over and races for the exit.
- Second half
In what book does a fleeing girl charge at a rock wall that is really a railroad tunnel?
✓ Answer
The Island of Forgotten Gods by Victor Piñeiro
With the shadowbeast closing in, Kira leads her cousins down a dark trail that seems to end at a wall of rock, and Nico thinks she has lost her mind. Then she runs right through it, because it is one of the old railroad tunnels near Guajataca, and her quick thinking gets them all to safety.
- Second half
In what book does a toddler in a butterfly costume flutter along cliffs near a big gray lighthouse?
✓ Answer
The Island of Forgotten Gods by Victor Piñeiro
At the cliffs by the Cabo Rojo lighthouse, Nico notices a family in pastel colors whose little one, dressed as a butterfly, looks like a giant monarch fluttering around. Later the toddler wanders much too close to the edge, and Nessi rushes over to help.
- Near the end
In what book does a boy take a phone call on the floor "in a little cocoon of cabinets"?
✓ Answer
The Island of Forgotten Gods by Victor Piñeiro
Still shaken from his nightmare, Nico slides down the kitchen wall with the old house phone to talk to Mami. The call brings hard news about the high school he hoped to attend and about his parents.
