The Folk Keeper

Folk Keeper

Section 1

Vocabulary
  1. drudgery: hard, menial, or dull work
  2. ebb: the movement of the tide to sea
  3. entreated: ask someone earnestly or anxiously to do something
  4. indulge: allow oneself to enjoy the pleasure of something
  5. prodigious: remarkably or impressively great in extent, size or degree
  6. tawdry: showy but cheap and of poor quality
Comprehension Questions
  1. In the Cellar, where the Folk reside, Corinna is queen of the world. (pg. 1)
  2. Corinna’s last act for the Folk of the Rhysbridge Foundling Home is to steal Matron’s breakfast sausage. (pg. 3)
  3. Corinna does not speak her anger because you must never give your anger away. (pg. 5)
  4. Lord Merton knows Corinna’s secret that she is a girl and that she always knows the time. (pg. 7/8)
  5. Every rhyme that comes to Corinna has a hole in it’s middle where the heartbeat should be. (pg. 9)
  6. Corinna lets Sir Edward and Lady Alicia assume that she had a proper apprenticeship in the Foundling Home, but in reality she had bribed some lads to teach her to read and write. (pg. 13)
  7. No-one, not even a Folk Keeper can see the Folk because they cannot bear the light. (pg. 15)
  8. There are no Sealfolk on the mainland. (pg. 25)
  9. A good Folk Keeper knows all about charms. (pg. 25)
  10. Corinna wants “…to know people’s secret passions” because then you have power over them if needed. (pg. 29)
  11. The Folk of Cliffsend draw terrific strength from their stony home. (pg. 30)
  12. Corinna is able to climb the tree when running from the Hill Hounds because it is growing in the shelter of a wall and is thin and stunted. (pg. 33)
  13. If Corinna had known to follow to follow the smell of baking bread she would have found the Cellar by herself as it was just outside the kitchens. (pg. 42)
  14. Corinna is most sorry that she doesn’t have time to go sailing with Finian. (pg. 44)

Section 2

Vocabulary
  1. futile: pointless, serving no useful purpose
  2. malice: to cause pain, injury or distress to another
  3. nimble: quick and light in movement, action or thought
  4. oust: drive out or expel someone from a position or place
  5. tether: to tie an animal with a rope or chain so as to restrict its movement
  6. wraith: a ghost or ghostlike image of someone
Comprehension Questions
  1. The Folk do not have hearts and do not care for kindness. (pg. 47)
  2. The first true thing that Corinna tells Lady Alicia is that she likes the rain. (pg. 49)
  3. Lady Rona is the deceased first wife of Lord Merton. (pg. 51)
  4. The only one to see Corinna slip off to the cellar with hundreds of pins stuck in her clothes is the mournful old dog Taffy. (pg. 53)
  5. According to Corina the Folk in the Northern Isles grow fierce during the Storms of the Equinox, which occur in the autumn and spring. (pg. 57)
  6. Corinna leaves her Folk bag in the Cellar because she doesn’t want to accidently lose the bag overboard while sailing with Finian. (pg. 58)
  7. Corinna shows Finian that she could coax the wind into the sails of the boat. (pg. 59)
  8. Corinna was given the name Stonewall by a matron at the foundling home because she was stubborn and wouldn’t boil the soiled linens. (pg. 60)
  9. The Lady Rona’s child is buried under the church eaves. (pg. 62
  10. While in the Cellar Corinna realizes that she is not protected against Finian knowing she is responsible for the dogs destroying Edward’s trophy skin. (pg. 69)
  11. Corinna should have known never to reveal any of her true convictions. (pg. 72)
  12. Old Francis disappears during the Storms of the Equinox. (pg. 73)
  13. The May Day garlands are scattered in a circle around the Manor to restrict the power of the Folk to the caverns. (pg. 74)
  14. Finian dresses up as a Cliffsend fisherman for the Masquerade Ball. (pg. 78)

Section 3

Vocabulary
  1. crescendo: a gradual increase in loudness in a piece of music
  2. implacable: unable to be placated
  3. languorous: the state or feeling, often plesant of tiredness or inertia
  4. lustrous: having shine
  5. obliged: legally or morally bound to an action or course of action
  6. tranquil: free from disturbance; calm
Comprehension Questions
  1. The Folk Keeper must always leap over the bonfire first. (pg. 82)
  2. Holding a brick of warm peat to your breast glows against the skin and gives a feeling of tranquility. (pg. 85)
  3. Corinna says that she will never marry. (pg. 86)
  4. When Corinna dives underwater to save Finian she is reborn; she no longer needs air, she can close her ears, and is weightless, which give her joy. (pg. 87/88)
  5. When another hand reaches for Coinna she sinks below the surface of the water because she was not ready to return to the world of laughter, tears and a past. (pg. 89/90)
  6. When Corinna finds her feet are sure and light up the cliff path it is as if she had memorized the cliff and knew all the crags. (pg. 92)
  7. Corinna believes Finian would laugh if he knew that the color of the hair inside her peat brick was red like his. (pg. 92)
  8. Corinna coaxes< Finian to go sailing with her the next day. (pg. 94)
  9. After Corinna drips her blood into the ocean the sea’s color turned dark, the waves arched with anger and a terrible storm began to brew. (pg. 97)
  10. After a wave smashes Corinna into the mast she realizes that the water around her ankles isn’t coming from the rain and crashing waves, but from a crack in the boats boards. (pg. 98)
  11. According to Corinna you cannot call the Seafold at low tide. (pg. 100)
  12. Everyone thinks breathing in is so important, but no-one thinks about the importance of breathing out. (pg. 104)
  13. Corinna’s mother goes mad and refuses to ever look at the sea when her husband Lord Merton burned her sealskin. (pg. 108)
  14. Sir Edward has hunted long enough to be able to tell when an animal is about to bolt. (pg. 109)

Section 4

Vocabulary
  1. complacent: showing smug or uncritical satisfaction with oneself or one’s achievements
  2. gauze: a thin translucent fabric of silk, linen, or cotton
  3. inexplicable: unable to be explained or accounted for
  4. inextricable: impossible to disentangle or separate
  5. linger: to stay in place longer than is necessary, typically because of a reluctance to leave
  6. savor: to taste and enjoy completely
Comprehension Questions
  1. The Folk did not frighten Corinna as much as she frightened herself. (pg. 125)
  2. When Corinna is alone she “can carve words from air and float them in a sea of rhyme.” She has the last word. (pg. 127)
  3. Once Corinna emerges from the Cellar she realizes at once that the Manor is empty. (pg. 130)
  4. Corinna is transformed from savage to servant with a bar of soap and some servant’s clothes borrowed from Mrs. Baines storeroom. Pge 132)
  5. While at the stonecutter’s tray Corinna lingers over a tiny crafted quartz rooster that has a swagger and strut. (pg. 134)
  6. Finian pulls Corinna away from the crowd and down an alley at the Harvest Fair. (pg. 135)
  7. When Finian first met Corinna he knew by the way she carried herself that she was no boy. (pg. 137)
  8. Finian says that Corinna could come back from the sea for the Folk, for him and to marry him. (pg. 140)
  9. The color of the strands of hair in Finian’s peat brick on Midsummer’s Eve was silver. (pg. 140)
  10. Finian and Lady Alicia have gone to Rhysbridge to testify before the courts that there is an heir with a greater claim than their to Marblehaugh Park. (pg. 148)
  11. Corinna could not confine herself to the land even for Finian whom she loved. (pg. 148)
  12. Taffy’s grave is marked by dozens of amber beads glowing in the cool autumn sun. (pg. 151)
  13. The direction of the Seal Rock is built into Corinna’s bones. (pg. 157)
  14. When Corinna’s Sealskin is peeling away from her she is thankful she has her words because she could tell her story. Pg. 159)