The text presents multiple models of survival. What do you think the book presents as the most essential element for enduring extreme trauma? Why?

What is the role of religious faith in The Boys in the Light? How does this treatment affect your reading of the book, and why?

Drawing on examples from the text, consider how the narrative defines good leadership, especially in crisis environments.

How does the book use food and drink as a sign of a) individual culture and b) shared humanity? In what ways do these two functions intersect?

How does Willner use and describe physical settings to create atmosphere in her book? What effects do these descriptions have on your sense of immersion and reality while reading?

How does the narrative use its concluding section to argue for the importance of testimony and collective remembrance? What does it present as the benefits of this?

What does Willner’s narrative have to say about fatherhood? Consider paternal images and figures as well as biological fathers in the text.

The historian Stephane Gerson has written that family histories “not only address analytical questions, but also bear witness, pay homage, grapple with unresolved legacies, and reflect on choices and decisions that often remain unsaid in [unconnected] historical works.” In what ways does The Boys in the Light support or refute Gerson’s opinion, and why?