All Fours Quiz – 20 Questions
Welcome to the All Fours quiz. Whether you just finished the book or want to revisit its layers, these 20 questions span plot, character motivation, themes, and broader synthesis. Each question is based on the novel’s events, dialogue, and symbols. After the quiz you’ll find a complete answer key with brief explanations. Use the links if you need a refresher on the book summary, questions and answers, or the ending explained.
Plot and Sequence (8 Questions)
1. What does the narrator do with $20,000 during her stay in Monrovia?
- A) Buys a vintage car
- B) Hires Claire to redecorate her motel room
- C) Donates it to a local charity
- D) Pays off Davey’s debt
2. How does the narrator first meet Davey?
- A) At a bar in Monrovia
- B) He cleans her windshield at a gas station
- C) Through a mutual friend at an art opening
- D) He is the Hertz employee who rents her a car
3. What triggers the narrator’s traumatic flashback during the Memorial Day parade?
- A) The sound of firecrackers
- B) The smell of hot dogs
- C) A memory of Sam’s emergency C-section after a fetal‑maternal hemorrhage
- D) Seeing a child fall off a bike
4. Why does the narrator initially decide to drive across the country instead of flying to New York?
- A) She is afraid of flying
- B) She wants to visit landmarks along the way
- C) She hopes the trip will transform her from a “Parker” into a “Driver”
- D) Harris insists on a road trip for the family
5. What object does Davey leave with the narrator as a keepsake?
- A) His plaid shirt
- B) A silver ring
- C) A notebook
- D) A pair of driving gloves
6. What does the narrator spray‑paint on a chair in Monrovia?
- A) “I love you”
- B) “CALL ME”
- C) “Davey”
- D) “Room 321”
7. Who reveals to the narrator that Davey has moved to Sacramento with Claire?
- A) Irene
- B) Jordi
- C) Audra
- D) Skip
8. What ritual do the narrator and Arkanda share when they meet at the Excelsior Motel?
- A) They perform a pat‑down ritual to cut through fame‑induced tension
- B) They exchange wedding vows
- C) They watch a dance video together
- D) They burn incense and chant
Character Motivation (5 Questions)
9. Why does Harris call the narrator a “Parker” at the party in Chapter 2?
- A) Because she always parks the car
- B) Because she needs applause and is easily disappointed
- C) Because she refuses to drive long distances
- D) Because she organizes family outings
10. What is Jordi’s main reaction when the narrator tells her about the open‑marriage arrangement?
- A) She immediately approves and offers advice
- B) She is stunned and buys cigarettes
- C) She laughs and calls it a joke
- D) She storms out of the room
11. Why does Irene (Davey’s mother) take the narrator to lunch?
- A) To ask her to stop seeing Davey
- B) To reveal that she knows about the affair and to describe Davey’s sexual education
- C) To discuss real estate in Monrovia
- D) To invite her to a family dinner
12. What motivates the narrator to begin hormone replacement therapy?
- A) She wants to alleviate hot flashes
- B) She hopes to regain libido and prepare for filming a dance for Davey
- C) Her doctor insists it is necessary for bone health
- D) She wants to get pregnant again
13. Why does Harris agree to “favored nations” rights in the open marriage?
- A) He believes it will save their marriage
- B) He wants permission to see other women, including Paige
- C) He is forced by the narrator’s ultimatum
- D) He hopes the narrator will stop seeing Davey
Theme and Symbol (4 Questions)
14. What does the motel room (Room 321) come to represent for the narrator by the end of the novel?
- A) A prison she cannot escape
- B) A sacred, ordinary space where she feels free and whole
- C) A symbol of her failed affair
- D) A reminder of her childhood home
15. In Chapter 20, the narrator calls her interviews with friends “open‑sourcing” her marital crisis. What theme does this concept illustrate?
- A) The privatization of marriage
- B) The collective, experimental approach to relationships and desire
- C) The narrator’s desire to sell her story
- D) The need for marital secrets
16. What does the painting of a woman sealed before a cave (found under the motel bed) symbolize?
- A) The narrator’s fear of death
- B) A cautionary image of a woman who failed to be bold enough to enter her own desires
- C) The cave as a literal hiding place
- D) A portrait of Audra’s grandmother
17. How does the narrator’s dance in the final performance (Chapter 30) transform her understanding of the motel room?
- A) She realizes the room was never special
- B) She sees that the whole world is the motel room, making every day sacred and every place a site of potential freedom
- C) She decides to buy the motel
- D) She believes the room has become a tourist attraction
Synthesis (3 Questions)
18. Compare the narrator’s relationship with Davey to her marriage with Harris. How do these two relationships represent different forms of intimacy and control?
19. In what ways does the novel challenge traditional ideas of marriage and monogamy? Use specific examples from the characters’ arrangements.
20. How does the narrator’s evolving relationship with her own aging and desire (especially through perimenopause) shape the story’s arc? Refer to at least two key scenes.
Answer Key
1. B – Hires Claire to redecorate her motel room. The narrator pays Claire $20,000 for new carpet, wallpaper, tiles, and a mattress. (Chapter 6)
2. B – Davey cleans her windshield at a gas station in Monrovia. They later meet at a restaurant and talk. (Chapter 5)
3. C – The parade triggers a memory of Sam’s traumatic birth via emergency C‑section after a fetal‑maternal hemorrhage. (Chapter 7)
4. C – After Harris labels her a “Parker” (needy for applause), she decides to drive to become a “Driver,” hoping the trip will transform her. (Chapter 2)
5. A – Before leaving, Davey gives her his plaid shirt as a keepsake. (Chapter 11)
6. B – She spray‑paints “CALL ME” on a chair in Monrovia, later retrieved after Jordi’s intervention. (Chapter 12)
7. C – Audra tells the narrator that Davey moved to Sacramento with Claire two months earlier. (Chapter 17)
8. A – Arkanda uses a pat‑down ritual to cut through the tension caused by fame. (Chapter 28)
9. B – Harris explains that “Parkers” need applause and are easily disappointed, contrasting with “Drivers” who are grounded and content. (Chapter 2)
10. B – Jordi is stunned and buys cigarettes after hearing about the open‑marriage arrangement. (Chapter 23)
11. B – Irene reveals she knows about the affair and describes Davey’s sexual education with her friend Audra and his practice of kundalini. (Chapter 9)
12. B – After Dr. Mendoza diagnoses perimenopause and prescribes Estradiol cream, the narrator worries about losing desire. She later does hormone therapy to prepare for a dance meant to attract Davey. (Chapter 14–16)
13. B – Harris asks for “favored nations” rights, meaning the same rules apply to him, and he later starts a relationship with Paige. (Chapter 22)
14. B – By the end, the narrator sees the motel room as a sacred, ordinary space where she finds freedom and wholeness, and she realizes the whole world is the room. (Chapter 28, 30)
15. B – The “open‑sourcing” concept illustrates a collective, experimental approach to relationships, as the narrator interviews friends about their non‑traditional arrangements. (Chapter 20)
16. B – The painting is described as a cautionary image of an older woman who sealed herself off from possibility, reflecting the narrator’s fear of not being bold enough to enter her own desires. (Chapter 17)
17. B – During the dance, she realizes that “the whole world was the motel room,” making every day Wednesday and every place a site of possibility. (Chapter 30)
18. Short-answer model response: The narrator’s marriage to Harris represents stability, co‑parenting, and a history of unspoken arrangements—but also emotional distance and performance. With Davey, she experiences raw, non‑goal‑oriented intimacy, fantasy, and a kind of suspended time. Harris later participates in roleplay that acknowledges her desires, but the marriage remains a container of negotiations, while her affair with Davey was a sealed‑off experience that transformed her self‑understanding. (Chapters 3, 8, 22)
19. Short-answer model response: The novel critiques monogamy as a default structure. Harris and the narrator create an open marriage with “favored nations” rights. Friends like Caitlyn practice cuckolding, Destiny writes bespoke vows allowing non‑monogamy, and Isra transitions genders while maintaining a friendship with her ex‑wife. The narrator’s own arrangement with Kris adds a queer dimension, and she argues that marriage should evolve like a parent‑child relationship. (Chapters 20, 22–27)
20. Short-answer model response: Perimenopause triggers the narrator’s fear of losing desire and relevance. Her doctor reframes menopause as liberation, not loss (Chapter 26). She uses hormone therapy to attempt a dance for Davey, but later realizes desire is mental and can be cherished. The novel ends with her accepting aging and finding a new kind of freedom in her weekly motel ritual, learning that the cave (sexuality, freedom) never fully closes if she keeps walking toward surprise. (Chapters 14, 16, 17, 26, 30)