Excerpt from A Day at the Beach
Rob Baur

1 Because Lola's family invited Emma to join them on their annual trip to the ocean, Lola and Emma—who were best friends—were thrilled about their upcoming vacation at the beach. On the day of the trip, Lola, her family, and Emma packed the car and drove toward the shore. The drive was long, and they didn't reach the beach until it was already dark. It was difficult to see, and Lola's father passed the hotel and had to turn around. Finally, Lola's family reached their destination. Exhausted from their trip, they all went to sleep as soon as they arrived.
What is the MOST LIKELY reason that it takes the family so long to get to the beach?

A) The road was very bumpy.
B) They wanted to get there at night.
C) The day was too hot to drive fast.
D) They live far away from the beach.

word count 168

serve the people! ,” smoothly translated by julia lovell, offers an initial sample of yan lianke’s writing to an english-speaking audience. a bluntly drawn, mildly erotic fable, it teases mao zedong by poking fun at a true believer who obeys the chairman’s precepts too literally. to a western sensibility, the broad strokes of yan lianke’s humor would seem to pose little risk of inciting rebellion, whether of the flesh or of the body politic. but then, part of the book’s attraction is that it doesn’t have a western sensibility. it lets the reader see — or rather, intuit — what jokes chinese officials don’t consider funny, and how very little it takes for a writer to be branded an incendiary in 21st-century china, more than three decades after the death of mao, a decade after the death of deng xiaoping and seven years since china entered the world trade organization, a move that would seem to signal a willingness (however wary) to mingle with the rest of the world.

answer is b "guaranteed the safety of any merchant"

just took the test!