A Good Girl's Guide to Murder

Use these essay questions as writing and critical thinking exercises for all levels of writers, and to build their literary analysis skills by requiring textual references throughout the essay.

Differentiation Suggestion: For English learners or struggling writers, strategies that work well include graphic organizers, sentence frames or starters, group work, or oral responses.

Scaffolded Essay Questions

Student Prompt: Write a short (1-3 paragraph) response using one of the bulleted outlines below. Cite details from the text over the course of your response that serve as examples and support.

1. Pip's capstone project entries provide the narrative structure for A Good Girl's Guide to Murder.

• How does Pip characterize the key figures of the case (including Andie Bell) in these entries? (topic sentence)
• How does Pip's characterization of these key figures differ from the Fairview community's characterization of them, particularly in how they characterized Sal before he was proven innocent?
• In your conclusion, explain how The Importance of Finding Out the Truth compelled Pip to seek answers to the questions that surrounded the disappearance of Andie Bell. Consider how the structure of the narrative, using Pip's capstone entries, clearly demonstrates why the truth is so important to Pip. 

2. As Pip unravels the mystery surrounding the Bell case, she learns things about herself as well.

• What factors influence Pip's identity search throughout the novel? Does she have a clear sense of the kind of person she wants to be? (topic sentence)
• What sort of moral dilemmas test Pip and, in doing so, shape her identity?
• In your conclusion, describe how Pip's Search for Identity is one of her primary character motivations, and answer the question: Did Pip become the sort of person she wants to be by the end of the novel?

3. The Singh family faces conflicts, both implicit and explicit, as the novel progresses.

• What are some of the implicit/explicit conflicts that the Singh family faces? (topic sentence)
• Are certain conflicts more devastating for the Singh family than others?
• In your conclusion, explain if the Public Shame of the Singh family from their community is an explicit or an implicit conflict. Also explain whether the Singh family resolves their guilt after Sal's exoneration or not. 

Full Essay Assignments

Student Prompt: Write a structured and well-developed essay. Include a thesis statement, at least three main points supported by text details, and a conclusion.

1. Contrast Pip's and Stanley Forbes's journalistic intentions regarding the Bell case in terms of their beliefs about Sal. How do Stanley's opinions of Sal shape his reporting, and how does this compare with the way in which Pip's opinions of Sal inform her approach to her reporting? Consider Stanley's ties to the community of Fairview and ask yourself if he might be influenced by the attitude of Public Shaming that the community feels toward the Singh family. What other details about Stanley's character bring his objectivity into question?

2. How does Pip's character evolve based on what she undergoes? What initially motivates her, and how is this motivation expressed? Does Pip end up a different person from when the novel begins? In your response, cite three moments from the novel that affected the course of Pip's character development—one moment from the beginning, the middle, and the end each—to trace the full arc of her evolution. How does Pip's Search for the Truth about Andie coincide with Pip's discovering her own Identity?

3. What role does the Fairview community play throughout the novel? How does the Fairview community's attitude affect Pip, if at all? How does it affect the Singh family? Consider the character of The Fairview Community as an entity, alongside the other characters in the novel. In your response, apply the concept of Public Shame as a connecting thread in your essay, describing how public shaming by the Fairview community affects the characters and the course of the narrative itself.