The following questions are intended to enhance your reading group’s discussion of Margaret Regis’ When Our Mothers Went to War  about the widely varied experiences of American women in World War II.

1. What did you know about women in World War II before you read the book?

2. Were you surprised by the many roles and experiences the women had during the war?

3. How do you think the women’s experiences during World War II differed from the men’s?

4. Do you think women had a different goals than men in regard to the war? What motivated women to do the things they did?

5. Which part of the book interested you most?

6. What do you think of the struggles female war correspondents faced to report from the combat zone? Do you think these kinds of obstacles still exist for women in journalism today?

7. With oil shortages and rising food prices today, what can we learn from the way home front women coped during World War II?

8. What do you think of the treatment of African American women and other minorities in the military and in the workforce? Have conditions changed significantly today?

9. Women in occupied nations took tremendous risks to escape, resist or simply survive. What qualities do you think helped these women endure?

10. How did World War II change women?