1. Why do you think Cisneros deliberately avoided using the words ‘short’? And how is ‘small’ different from little? What kind of effect was she able to create? What might it have to do with the rest of the story?
2. Which chapter do the first five paragraphs remind you of? In what ways?
3. How did the girls get the shoes? How do you know?
4. A literary allusion is when one work refers to another work of literature drawing some resemblance of similarity between the two pieces of writing. Identify the literary allusion(s) made in this chapter. What genre is the story from? How are the two stories related? Where is the resemblance?
5. While the girls are excited about the new shoes, are they comfortable in them? How do you know?
6. What does Mr. Benny mean when he says “Them are dangerous”? How can “shoes” be dangerous?
7. Immediately after passing Mr. Benny, the girls ask each other “Do you like these shoes?” and each say yes. Why do they like them? What might they be a symbol for? Given the ending of the story, what is particularly irony about this passage?
8. When Lucy’s mother throws away the shoes in the end, why doesn’t anybody complain? Are the shoes in the end magic?