2 . Draper, the owner of a second-hand bookstore, was sorting through a pile of old books when an envelope fell from one. Inside was an undated _______ and a faded photo of a woman holding a little girl on her lap. The letter said if Bethany was _______ it, it meant the author had died.

Tears were welling up in Draper's eyes. These were a _______ woman's last words to her child. He had to _______ Bethany. “Whoever it is will _______ this,” he thought. “You wouldn’t _______ a letter like that.”

He supposed if the _______ ended up in his shop then Bethany was likely from around Bishop Auckland. And he thought he _______ recognized the little girl's face. Even if she’d left the area, there might be someone in the town who would recognize the _______.

He started with the local newspaper. The Northern Echo ran the story of the ________ letter.

________, Bethany Gash, now 21 and a mother herself，was on Facebook about 10 miles away ________ a close friend messaged her to check out the ________. As she read her mother's ________, which she thought had been lost forever, she said she thought she must be ________.

1.

A．message

B．email

C．postcard

D．letter

2.

A．reading

B．destroying

C．forgetting

D．copying

3.

A．determined

B．kind

C．selfish

D．dying

4.

A．find

B．introduce

C．phone

D．comfort

5.

A．enjoy

B．avoid

C．want

D．like

6.

A．tear up

B．throw away

C．cut up

D．pull out

7.

A．book

B．girl

C．reporter

D．news

8.

A．hardly

B．accidentally

C．unfortunately

D．actually

9.

A．author

B．picture

C．teacher

D．stranger

10.

A．wet

B．valuable

C．lost

D．broken

11.

A．However

B．Therefore

C．Meanwhile

D．Eventually

12.

A．when

B．why

C．where

D．how

13.

A．ticket

B．magazine

C．homework

D．article

14.

A．vocabularies

B．terms

C．words

D．languages

15.

A．writing

B．dreaming

C．joking

D．playing

3 . When I was in elementary school, I enjoyed telling lies. That was a lot of _________. As I got older, my _________ continued. I enjoyed people’s reactions to my seemingly amazing life. But when I was 15, that all   _________. I met someone I really _________ , who put me on the path to honesty.

In my usual fashion, I told him lies just like telling other people. I made up _________ to get him to be more interested in me _________I wasn’t sure if the truth would be enough to make him want to continue working with me . But he knew me so well.

One day he told me ,”I can’t talk to you on the _________anymore because I can’t see your eyes, and so I am not sure when you are lying to me. “That _________shocked me, because I didn’t know he knew I had been lying to him, and he was willing to end our _________ for those lies. I __________ at that moment that I would never lie to him again. It was a __________ transition(转变)to make because I was used to exaggerating(夸大) experiences to get attention. But because of him, I made a deal with myself never to tell any lie again. __________, his trust in me was rebuilt.

That was how I learned the ________ of honesty. I felt more __________ when I told the truth. As Merlin said in a movie,”when a man lies, he murders some part of the world.” It is __________.

1.

A．pride

B．relief

C．care

D．fun

2.

A．blaming

B．lying

C．struggling

D．designing

3.

A．changed

B．spread

C．returned

D．completed

4.

A．helped out

B．put away

C．looked up to

D．caught up with

5.

A．orders

B．stories

C．poems

D．songs

6.

A．though

B．while

C．because

D．but

7.

A．stage

B．ground

C．phone

D．street

8.

A．nearly

B．gradually

C．slowly

D．really

9.

A．friendship

B．journey

C．love

D．discussion

10.

A．proved

B．promised

C．prayed

D．imagined

11.

A．hard

B．smooth

C．frequent

D．violent

12.

A．At once

B．At first

C．For long

D．In time

13.

A．cost

B．tradition

C．value

D．condition

14.

A．lonely

B．careful

C．powerful

D．independent

15.

A．true

B．lucky

C．possible

D．silly

4 . Just over 12 months ago I gave myself a challenge: give up spending on all but the essentials for a whole year. It hasn't always been easy, but a year on I am wealthier and wiser. Embarrassingly, I have also realised just how much money I've squandered down the pubs in restaurants and through mindless shopping.

Free of any financial worries, I was spending without thinking. Stuck in a cycle of consumerism, I was struggling in vain to spend my way to happiness. Giving up spending for a year was an extreme approach, but I wanted to taste extreme frugality, shake up my spending patterns and overpay my mortgage instead of shopping. I could continue to pay my bills, including mortgages, broadband(宽带), phone bill, charity donations, life insurances, money to help my family and basic groceries.

It was not easy, especially in the first few months. There were lows, such as when I missed my favourite jazz concerts and hit films. There have also been some awkward moments when I've turned up to a friend's house for dinner empty-handed. I did a lot of washing up at my friends' houses in return this year.

I did find new ways to live, however. Using sites such as Eventbrite I have been to film screenings, wine tasting evenings and theatre productions for free. Living in London I have a wealth of free cultural activities on my doorstep and I've been to more art exhibitions this year than ever before. I even managed a free holiday, cycling the

Suffolk and Norfolk coast and camping on beaches. It's something I'd never done before and probably wouldn't have, were it not for the challenge.

The last 12 months have taught me what things I really need. I can honestly say I' m happier now. I've gained confidence and skills, done things and met lovely people I wouldn't have otherwise done or met.

1. In the past the author wasted much money on the following EXCEPT .

A．purposeless shopping	B．basic groceries
C．restaurants	D．pubs

2. We can infer that the purpose of the author's no-spending challenge is to .

A．try to form a virtue of frugality	B．change her former spending habits
C．pay off her mortgage as soon as possible	D．reserve money for her everyday bills

3. What do we know about the author during her no-spending year?

A．She did a lot of washing and cooking in pubs.

B．She tried cycling and camping for the first time.

C．She explored more cultural activities in London.

D．She attended concerts and wine evenings for free.

4. How does the author eventually feel about her no spending year?

A．It's discouraging.	B．It's challenging.
C．It's beneficial.	D．It's embarrassing.

5 . John’s parents acquired the washer when he was a small boy. It happened during World War Ⅱ. His family never _______ a washing machine and, since gasoline was expensive, they could not _______ trips to the laundry several miles away. Keeping clothes _______ became a problem for young John’s household.

A family friend joined the army, and his wife _______ to go with him. John’s family _______ to store their furniture while they were away. To the family’s _______, the friend suggested they use their Bendix. So this is how they _______ the washer.

Young John helped with the washing, and across the years he _______ a love for the old, green Bendix. But _______ the war ended. When the friends came to take it back, John grew terribly ________. His mother ________ him and said. “You must remember, that machine ________ belonged to us in the first place. That we ever got to use it at all was a gift. So, instead of being mad at it being taken ________, let’s use this ________ to be grateful that we had it at all.”

The lesson turned out ________. Years later, John watched his eight-year-old daughter die a slow and painful death of leukemia (白血病). Though he ________ for months with her death, John could not begin getting over from the ________ until he remembered the old Bendix.

His daughter was a ________. When he realized the simple fact, everything changed. He could now begin recovering from the death of his daughter. He started to see her as a marvelous gift that he was fortunate enough to ________ for a time. He felt ________. He found strength and recovery. He knew he could get through the valley of loss.

1.

A．required

B．repaired

C．saw

D．owned

2.

A．afford

B．take

C．have

D．ride

3.

A．warm

B．nice

C．clean

D．good

4.

A．agreed

B．prepared

C．managed

D．desired

5.

A．decided

B．offered

C．expected

D．promised

6.

A．astonishment

B．disappointment

C．sadness

D．regret

7.

A．bought

B．got

C．borrowed

D．used

8.

A．achieved

B．reduced

C．produced

D．developed

9.

A．obviously

B．finally

C．immediately

D．peacefully

10.

A．upset

B．frightened

C．hopeless

D．confused

11.

A．explained

B．encouraged

C．comforted

D．taught

12.

A．once

B．already

C．never

D．hardly

13.

A．out

B．down

C．up

D．away

14.

A．success

B．event

C．treasure

D．chance

15.

A．invaluable

B．important

C．necessary

D．reasonable

16.

A．thought

B．struggled

C．missed

D．forgot

17.

A．lesson

B．illness

C．loss

D．difficulty

18.

A．gift

B．washer

C．death

D．loser

19.

A．spend

B．live

C．share

D．earn

20.

A．grateful

B．energetic

C．relaxed

D．happy

6 . “I once hoped to afford a wonderful telescope, but now I wish my father would be back.” Lucy Lawrence’s letter to Father Christmas written after his father had been knifed to death outside his school gate, must have touched every heart. Lucy went on to say that without his father he couldn’t see the stars in the sky. When those whom we love depart from us, we cannot see the stars for a while.
But Lucy, the stars are still there, and one day, when you are older and your tears have gone ,you will see them again . And, in a strange way, I expect that you will find your father is there too, in your mind and in your heart . I find that my parents , long dead now , still occur in many of my dreams and that I think of them perhaps more than I ever did when they were alive . I still live to please them and I’m still surprised by their reactions. I remember that when I became a professor , I was so proud , or rather so pleased with myself , that I couldn’t wait to write to my parents . The reply was a long time in coming, but when it did, all Mother said was “I hope this means that now you will have more time for the children! ” I haven’t forgotten. The values of my parents still live on.
It makes me pause and think about how I will live on in the hearts and minds of my children and of those for whom I care. Would I have been as ready as Philip Lawrence have been to face the aggressors, and to lay down my life for those in my care ? How many people would want me back for Christmas? It’s a serious thought, one to give me pause.
I pray silently , sometimes , in the dead of night ,that ancient cry of a poet “Deliver my soul from the sword（剑）, and my darling from the power of the evil .” Yet I know the death comes to us all, and sometimes comes suddenly. We must therefore plan to live forever, but live as if we will die tomorrow. We live on, I’m sure, in the lives of those we loved, and therefore we ought to have a care for what they will remember and what they will treasure. If more parents knew this in their hearts to be true, there might be fewer knives on our streets today.
1. According to the whole text we can see that the first paragraph .

A．shows the author’s pity on the kid

B．acts as an introduction to the discussion

C．puts forward the subject of the text

D．makes a clear statement of the author’s opinions

2. In the second paragraph the author mainly wants to explain to us .

A．why his parents often appear in his dream

B．how much he misses his parents now

C．when Lucy will get over all his sadness

D．how proud he was when he succeeded in life

3. What feeling did the author’s mother express in her reply?

A．Proud.	B．Excited.
C．Uninterested.	D．Uneasy.

4. What does the writer mean by the sentence taken from an old poem?

A．Call on criminals and murderers to lay down their guns.

B．Advise parents stay with their children safely at home.

C．Try to keep violence and murder far away from society.

D．Spend every day meaningfully in memory of the death.

7 . On a very cold evening, an old man was trembling with his nearly icy hair and beard beside a river. Anxiously, he was waiting for a _______across the river. The wait seemed _______ The old man sat on the ground waiting for quite a long time.
_______, he saw several horsemen coming. He watched them silently and let the first one pass by without even asking. Another passed by, and then another, till the last rider came near the old man.The old man caught the rider’s _______and said, “Sir, would you _______giving me a ride to the other side?”
_______his horse，the rider replied，“Of course not．”But it was so cold that the old man’s body was almost_______ He could not get_______ the ground．The horseman helped the old man onto his horse．He took the old man not just across the river,_______ to the old man’s home.
As they________the old man’s house, the horseman asked，“Sir, you let several other riders pass by without even asking. Then I________and you asked me for a ride at once. Why? ________ I had said ‘no’ and left you there?”
The old man stared at the rider straight in the eyes, and said, “I looked________the eyes of the other riders. I quickly saw that they didn’t________It would be________ even asking them for a ride.But in your eyes，I saw________ I knew that you would help me．”
The words________the rider deeply．“Thank you for what you’ve said，”he told the man．“I hope I will never leave others ________because I’m too busy, and every citizen does ________in my heart.”
With that, Thomas Jefferson，the third president of the US, turned his horse around and made his ________back to the White House.1.

A．trip

B．ride

C．help

D．drive

2.

A．cruel

B．boring

C．unfortunate

D．endless

3.

A．Gradually

B．Finally

C．Sadly

D．Surprisingly

4.

A．eye

B．hand

C．back

D．face

5.

A．like

B．think

C．please

D．mind

6.

A．Riding

B．Speeding

C．Stopping

D．Leaving

7.

A．stuck

B．Shocked

C．frozen

D．injured

8.

A．on

B．down

C．in

D．off

9.

A．and

B．but

C．so

D．then

10.

A．neared

B．visited

C．arrived

D．left

11.

A．came in

B．came on

C．came up

D．came out

12.

A．Even if

B．What if

C．As if

D．Only if

13.

A．out

B．for

C．into

D．up

14.

A．wait

B．try

C．ask

D．care

15.

A．Useless

B．risky

C．dangerous

D．foolish

16.

A．loyalty

B．generosity

C．ambition

D．kindness

17.

A．attracted

B．comforted

C．touched

D．pleased

18.

A．alone

B．out

C．away

D．behind

19.

A．live

B．believe

C．count

D．help

20.

A．living

B．choice

C．mind

D．way

8 . When my daughter Sally was five, I bought Grimm’s Fairy Tales and read Snow White to her one night. At the end of the original Grimm tale, Snow White’s stepmother is made to put on red-hot iron shoes and dance until she falls down dead.

This came as something of a shock. I always thought fairytales had happy endings. And I didn’t want my five-year-old daughter going to sleep thinking: “Thank goodness they tortured (折磨) that old woman to death.” That’s when I decided to write fairy tales.

In the years that followed, I wrote tales non-stop and read them to Sally at bedtime. The Corn Dolly was based on a child who was always complaining; The Silly King was just a silly story Sally loved; I wrote The Witch and the Rainbow Cat for Sally because of her enormous   appetite for stories about witches while Dr Bonocolus’s Devil is a new version of the Faust legend．Nicobobinus, however, was different. I wrote this book when Sally was older and took up all things girls have to do — who’s friends with who, who stuck a sticker on the back of whose boyfriend, or whatever thing she felt funny.

Nicobobinus, the boy who could do anything, came out of my desire for a more innocent world. He lived a long time ago, in a city called Venice. Only his best friend, Rosie, knew he could, and nobody took any notice of anything Rosie said, because she was always having wild ideas anyway. Nicobobinus was so different that it turned out to be an instant hit. The Times called me “an author setting out to rival the classic fairytales”. I asked Sally what she thought of Nicobobinus. She said it was her favourite.

1. What led the writer to start writing fairy tales for her daughter?

A．The frightening ends of past fairy tales.

B．His daughter’s strong interest in fairy tales.

C．His desire to let his daughter know more stories.

D．His attempt to fill his daughter’s bedtime with something.

2. We can infer from the third paragraph that the writer _____.

A．was a very productive fairy tale writer.

B．based all his stories on some old legends.

C．never described witches in his fairy tales.

D．created his stories out of his own interest.

3. When creating Nicobobinus, the first thing the writer considered was _____.

A．what story the publisher wanted to get.

B．the changes of his daughter’s interests.

C．ways to keep his daughter Sally innocent.

D．the difference of the story from other stories.

4. The underlined word “rival” in the last paragraph can be replaced by _____.

A．follow	B．explore
C．challenge	D．recommend

9 . I got a guitar for my birthday, and since then I have been struggling. It’s kind of sad. To be honest, it is ____ how many problems are caused by such little things in the life of a teenager .It has awakened another side of myself ____ me. And it couldn’t have happened at a worse time.
I’m a senior, I’m going to ____ soon and I know what college I’m going to. And now I have to deal with this little voice in my head constantly ____ me that I’m going to be a rock star, not a scientist.
A few weeks ago I was given the ____ simple task of writing a short story. I sat down to ____ a beautiful work of fiction that would ____ my teacher and classmates. To be honest, this is an area I generally feel very ____ in. I really enjoy it and such writing tasks used to take the ____ amount of time.
So I was ____ to write my story, and across the room lay my beautiful birthday present. “Once upon a time,” I wrote. Then I stopped, ____ in my chair, and stared for a moment at the ____. Its dark red paint was ____ and I could see my reflection in its perfect surface. And then my reflection started dancing and singing. I wasn’t ____ , but it sure was. I’d follow its ____ . So I seized my guitar and plucked (拨动) a string. I sat rocking with my guitar until late ____ the night. I was sure I was preparing for the ____ much more efficiently now that I wasn’t spending time writing stories.
Needless to say, no story was written, and many ____ arose in my mind. Since then, I have constantly asked, “Am I ____ for not wanting to do my work anymore?” More importantly, ____ , I’ve learned I really am going to be a rock star.1.

A．interesting

B．exciting

C．disappointing

D．surprising

2.

A．within

B．with

C．before

D．beyond

3.

A．work

B．write

C．graduate

D．retire

4.

A．teaching

B．advising

C．reminding

D．fooling

5.

A．actually

B．seemingly

C．obviously

D．partly

6.

A．plan

B．create

C．carry

D．continue

7.

A．frustrate

B．amuse

C．astonish

D．admire

8.

A．happy

B．rich

C．fortunate

D．strong

9.

A．least

B．most

C．largest

D．best

10.

A．trying

B．helping

C．refusing

D．learning

11.

A．seated

B．edited

C．turned

D．digested

12.

A．paper

B．instrument

C．floor

D．desk

13.

A．running

B．shining

C．deepening

D．fading

14.

A．playing

B．dreaming

C．moving

D．repeating

15.

A．lead

B．music

C．speed

D．rule

16.

A．of

B．at

C．for

D．into

17.

A．university

B．life

C．future

D．exam

18.

A．doubts

B．fears

C．discussions

D．problems

19.

A．curious

B．clever

C．normal

D．alone

20.

A．therefore

B．though

C．otherwise

D．even