A Torch Against the Night

How does a comparison between the Commandant’s calculated ambition and Emperor Marcus’s psychologically driven sadism reveal the different ways power corrupts individuals within the Martial Empire?

Analyze how A Torch Against the Night adapts and critiques elements of Roman history and society, such as its military structure, social hierarchy, and political conspiracies, to explore contemporary themes of systemic oppression, genocide, and rebellion.

Choose two motifs that run throughout the guide, like light and fire, or wounds and scars, and discuss how they function throughout the narrative. How do they serve to develop the themes of the novel?

Analyze Laia’s developing power of invisibility. How does it serve to develop her character, help her along her journey of growth, and contribute to the thematic meaning of her narrative?

The Waiting Place is described as both a spiritual realm and the domain of the Soul Catcher. Explore how this supernatural setting functions as a narrative device to externalize Elias’s internal conflicts regarding his mortality, guilt, and destiny. How does it challenge the novel’s otherwise grounded political and military struggles?

Examine the role of prophecies and supernatural foreknowledge in the novel, particularly those from the Augurs and the Soul Catcher. Do these prophetic glimpses into the future reinforce a sense of inescapable fate for characters like Helene and Elias, or do they create opportunities for agency and defiance?

Analyze the concept of loyalty through the arcs of secondary characters such as Avitas Harper, Afya Ara-Nur, and Cook. How do their shifting allegiances and pragmatic choices challenge the more idealistic or duty-bound perspectives of the main protagonists, offering a more nuanced exploration of survival and honor in a corrupt world?

Trace Elias’s arc over the course of the novel. How does his desire to escape shift to a new goal? How do his relationships with his mother and grandfather complicate his journey?