Question:
Read the text and answer the questions.
Characters in novels don't always do what the writer wants them to do. Sometimes they cause trouble, take on lives of their own, or even work against the writer. It's not just a problem for inexperienced authors: famed children's novelist Roald Dahl said he got the main character in his bookMatildaso "wrong"that when he'd finished his first version, he threw it away and started again. Of course it's not the characters' fault. The problem lies with the author. Take Stephen King, who admitted that writing working-class characters is more difficult nowadays because his own circumstances have changed. "It is definitely harder,"King said."When I wroteCarriemany years ago, I was one step away from physical labour." This is also true for characters' ages, added King."When you have small children, it is easy to write young characters because you observe them and you have them in your life all the time. But your kids grow up, it's been harder for me to write about this little 12-year-old girl in my new book because my models are gone." For other authors, such as Karen Fowler, there's one quality that can stop a character in its tracks: boredom."I had particular problems with the main character in my historical novelSister Noon,"she says."She had attitudes about race and religion that seemed appropriate to me for her time and class, but they were not attitudes I liked. Eventually I grew quite bored with her. You can write a book about a character you dislike or a character you disagree with, but I don't think you can write a book about a character who bores you." According to Neel Mukherjee, it was Adinath, a character inThe Lives of Others, who made him work the hardest."I think I struggled because it's difficult to write a character whose most prominent personal feature is weakness, as Adinath's is, without making that feature define him,"Mukherjee says. But a troublesome character is far from an unwelcome guest, he continues, arguing that "when characters work against the author they come alive and become unpredictable". "That is a fantastic thing to happen,"Mukherjee says."I celebrate it. It is one of the great, lucky gifts given to a writer."
1. What can be a huge hurdle for writers?
2. Is it just the inexperienced that have problems?
3. How many writers have mentioned having problems?
4. Who are they?
5. Is it easier to relate when author's fortunes change?
6. Which novel did the horror author say was easiest for him to pen in relation to his cast?
7. Why?
8. What other factor can play into writing difficulties, aside from class status?
9. Who claimed that was an issue?
10. Who had Mukherjee working the hardest?
11. Where was he from?

Numbered answers:
1. When characters don't do what the writer wants
2. It's not just a problem for inexperienced authors:
3. Four
4. Roald Dahl, Stephen King, Neel Mukerjee, Karen Fowler
5. No
6. Carrie
7. He was almost doing physical labor himself
8. Boredom with a character
9. Karen Fowler
10. Adinath
11. The Lives of Others

Question:
Read the text and answer the questions.
(CNN) -- Hope Murray thought her prayers had been answered.

Hope Murray, left, was desperate to find affordable health care for her daughter Meredith.

Her daughter, Meredith, desperately needed to see a doctor after suffering a brain injury in a car accident, but health insurance companies wouldn't sell her a policy because of her pre-existing condition.

So Murray was relieved to find Direct Medical Network Solutions Inc. while surfing the Internet. It wasn't insurance but a program that advertised deep discounts at doctors' offices and hospitals.

Murray immediately signed up for the program, which she says advertised $30 doctor visits and $50 visits to specialists.

"It was pretty phenomenal," Murray said. "They promised me everything was included," including doctor visits, vision, dental and hospital stays. "They even mentioned the Mayo Clinic."

Murray paid $314 for the card up front and then $179 each month after that.

Her daughter made an appointment to see Dr. Robert Epsten, a San Diego, California, gastroenterologist, to get treatment for her Crohn's disease.

Epsten was listed on Direct Med's Web site as being part of its network, but when Meredith arrived at Epsten's office, his staff said they didn't accept the Direct Med card. In fact, they said they'd never even heard of Direct Med, Hope Murray says.

According to Murray, this same scene played out with several other doctors and hospitals.

"I have never been more angry, more furious about anything in my life," Murray said. "It is a bogus scam that hurts people. It should be a crime for people to do that."
1. Who fell for a scam?
2. What did she sign up for?
3. What was it called?
4. Is it insurance?
5. Who required medical help?
6. Named?
7. Could she get insurance?
8. Why?
9. What did the program say it offered?
10. For how much?
11. And per month?
12. Who did she try to visit?
13. Why?
14. Did they take it?
15. Did other places take it?
16. Was it legit?

Numbered answers:
1. Hope Murray
2. a program that advertised deep discounts
3. Direct Medical Network Solutions Inc
4. No
5. her daughter
6. Meredith
7. No
8. because of her pre-existing condition
9. $30 doctor visits and $50 visits to specialists
10. $314 for the card
11. $179
12. Dr. Robert Epsten
13. to get treatment for her Crohn's disease
14. No
15. No
16. No

Question:
Read the text and answer the questions.
(CNN) -- Two former presidents reflected on their greatest regrets in office Monday, each looking back to issues that continue to plague the nation years later.

Former presidents and political rivals Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush now share philanthropic efforts.

Former Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton appeared together at a question-and-answer forum before the National Automobile Dealers Association in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Asked his biggest regret after leaving office, Bush said he now wonders whether he should have tried to get Saddam Hussein to leave office at the end of the first Gulf War in 1991.

He told the gathering, "I've thought a lot about it, but at the end of Desert Storm, the question was should we have kind of kept going on that road to death and all this slaughter until Saddam Hussein showed up and laid his sword on the table, surrendered. And the common wisdom was he wouldn't do that."

But he said a conversation with an FBI agent who interrogated Saddam after he was captured has made him reconsider.

Bush recalled their talk, "I said, 'What if we just say he has to come to surrender, would he have done it?' And this guy said, 'I'm absolutely convinced he would have.' My experts tell me he wouldn't have."

Bush said, "We ended it the way we said we would" as a military success, but noted a cleaner ending "would have been perfect."

He added, "If we had tried to get Saddam Hussein to come and literally surrender and put his sword on the table, I think it might have been avoided some of the problems that we did have in the future from him."
1. Who recalled their talk?
Numbered answers:
1. Former presidents