Francesca Annis as Jessica

Last week I posted on the character of Jessica in the Science Fiction classic, Dune, observing—among reflections on her many sterling qualities—that she is “still one of the very few…[characters I can think of in SFF ]…where being a mother is central, not peripheral, to her part in the story.”

I have by no means read all the available fiction in SFF, but I still had to put on my thinking cap. So although I am going to suggest a few more “Great Mums of SFF” now, I am hoping you may be able to help me out with a few more names.

Just to be clear, here are the criteria:

— the character doesn’t have to be the main character in the book but does have to be a central character with major page time.

— being a mother has to be central in some way to the character’s role in the story, rather than a background fact that otherwise doesn’t really affect the character’s arc. (For example, this would rule out Mara in the Empire series, where motherhood is not really a significant part of her arc: imho.)

— the character can appear in any form of SFF: from magic realism, through paranormal and steampunk to epic fantasy; from near future dystopia through space opera to hard Sci Fi. The book can also appear in Junior, YA, or adult SFF.

UK cover

OK, here’s the rest of my little list, besides Jessica:

• Briar Wilkes in Cherie Priest’s Boneshaker — Briar is the main character in the book and enters a zombie infested Seattle to rescue her son. (See cover above.)
• Rosala de Garsenc and Signy de Barbentain in Guy Gavriel Kay’s A Song For Arbonne — both are prominent characters in the story.  Signy is Countess of Arbonne and her relationship with her daughters, one living, one dead, plays an important part in shaping her character and role in the story. Rosala flees her husband and her country in the late stages of pregnancy because her father-in-law has threatened to take her baby and because she does not want her child raised to emulate his cruelty and megalomania.
• Jenny Waynest in Barbara Hambly’s Dragonsbane — Jenny is a wizard and the main character in the book; she has two sons and although they don’t play a large part in the story directly, part of what Jenny struggles with as a character is how to reconcile being a wizard as well as a mother.
• Teia in Elspeth Cooper’s The Wild Hunt quartet, is pregnant through much of the first two books and a new mother by the end of the third book (the fourth — not unlike mine 😉 — is forthcoming), so motherhood is unarguably central to her arc and gives it additional interest, imo. (See cover below right.)
• Catelyn Tully and Cersei Lannister in George RR Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series (aka A Game Of Thrones after the first book) are both women whose love and concern for their children (chiefly Catelyn) as well as their ambition for them (chiefly Cersei) are central to their character arcs in the story.
• Rayvan in David Gemmell’s The King Beyond the Gate scrapes in as both a sufficiently prominent secondary character and also because, as a widow with adult children, it is her concern for them as well as their community and wider issues of justice that drive her to becme a rebel and leader int he wider world.
• Morgaine is the central character in Marion Bradley’s The Mists of Avalon and the mother of Mordred (Gwydion), which shapes (or twists) both her arc and the “Matter of Britain” story. (See cover below right.)
• Vianne Rocher in Chocolat — since I have included magic realism in the Fantasy pantheon (as I believe it is) Vianne Rocher’s motherhood to Anouk is a key aspect of the book and she therefore belongs on this list.

Wow, with Jessica as well, I actually got past being able to count ’em all on the fingers of two hands: now we’re rollin’.

So please tell me more mothers of SFF (consistent with the criteria above) so all digits can be deployed! 😉

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Here are the other four covers for books mentioned above: