Summer of the Monkeys — Chapter 6

Narration Prompt

Summarize Chapter 6 in seven to ten sentences for an adult reading-group partner. Track the three-setting arc (kitchen, barnyard, bottoms), the chapter's economic revelation (Daisy's hospital fund, Papa's tobacco, Mama's egg money), and the quietly telling presence of Rowdy as the chapter's ethical gauge.

Discussion Questions

1. Chapter 6 is the book's first full integration of the monkey plot with the Daisy plot. Rawls leaks the hospital-savings economy through Grandma rather than through Mama or Papa. Discuss what novelistic work this sideways disclosure performs — and what it would have cost if Rawls had let Mama announce it directly.
2. The Gandy catastrophe is played for comedy, but its moral residue is serious: Jay Berry tested a new tool on a living creature with a specific role on the farm. In what ways does Rawls permit the comedy to absorb the ethical question, and where does he leave a trace of the unreconciled problem for the attentive reader?

+ 2 more questions in the complete study guide