HALLIE EPHRON: Such a good question. The mother who comes to mind is Ma, the mother of 5-year-old Jack in Emma Donoghue's ROOM. She tries to create a "normal" loving environment for her child in a situation that is anything but normal. The grandmother in Roald Dahl's THE WITCHES. She smokes cigars and loves her grandson even after he's been turned into a mouse.
HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Hmm. Very thought-provoking! And since the only mother that instantly springs to mind is Calpurnia -who is not Jem and Scout's mother, of course, and Atticus Finch-as-mother, whose wife haunts him--you'd think there would be more good mother figures. I'm really thinking about this now. Mother's are often nags, or dismissed, or crazy or creepy or obsessed (TRUST ME) or simply not pivotal. Someone to be gotten away from. Hmm. Am I wrong? Help me, Reds and readers. Seriously. I think we Reds ought to do an anthology to full that gap.
RHYS BOWEN: the quintessential awful mother is Mrs Bennett in Pride and Prejudice. Poor Lizzie... Complete embarrassment! But she is so well written that she is not over the top,but quite identifiable. I'm also thinking of Georgie's mother in my Royal Spyness books. Completely self absorbed, incapable of any mothering. Also rich, gorgeous and a man-magnet. Poor Georgie... But she makes for great comedy and drama. I was trying to think of good mothers. Little House on the Prairie? But she is too passive. She should have stopped her husband from dragging them all over the country!
But these are all, except for Jo March in Jo's Boys, peripheral characters. This has seemed especially true in crime fiction, and I was thinking about it quite a few years ago when I created Gemma James. I wanted to write a woman who was ambitious and good at her job, but whose role as a mother is an integral part of her story and her identity. I hope I've succeeded. Rhys's Molly Murphy is another great example--I would love to see more!
LUCY: Debs, can't believe we didn't come up with those two!! And of course we are looking forward to more of Clare as mother...
JENN McKINLAY: Such a good question! Of course, if we're talking Disney mothers, they're dead, or if she's a stepmother, she's evil. You gotta love the consistency. As for fully realized fictional moms, I love the Anne of Green Gables series in its entirety, and Anne becomes a wonderful mother after being an orphan. She reminds me of Deb's pick Jo in Jo's Boys. Other moms I get a kick out of are, Stephanie Plum's mom in Janet Evanovich's bounty hunter series. She's just so relatable to every mom I knew growing up. I also love Susan Elizabeth Phillips's depictions of moms as she really gives them the complexity a mama character requires, plus, she's wickedly funny.
Okay Reds, your turn to tell us about a fictional mother who caught your eye and why. And happy Mother's Day to everyone who mothers in whatever form that may take...
Happy Mother’s Day!
ReplyDeleteIt’s already a pretty amazing list, but I’ll add Kate Murray from Madeleine L’Engle’s “A Wrinkle in Time” who kept the family together and showed the kids it was cool to be a scientist. Then there’s Miss Honey from Roald Dahl’s “Matilda” . . . .
Oh, yes, two perfect perfect choices!
DeleteAbout Mrs. Bennett- there is a very funny modern retelling, Jane Austen in Boca by Paula Marantz Cohen. One of the main characters, a retired English Professor, gives a talk on Pride and Prejudice to a group of elderly, outspoken, traditional mothers in a FL retirement residence. They have some thoroughly refreshing and original opinions about Mrs. Bennett!
ReplyDeleteI haven't read that, but I've always felt Mrs. B got a bad rap. Yeah, she was fairly insufferable, but let's not forget she lived in a time where, by law, Mr. B couldn't leave anything to his own daughters; his entire inheritance had to go the the even more insufferable Mr. Collins, With 5 daughters, it was her JOB to find husbands for them. I blame British inheritance laws, not Mrs. B.
DeleteThat was the attitude of the elderly moms/grandmoms iln Cohen's book. Mr.s B was doing her job! (I'm pretty sure one of them responded to the professor with "Jane Austen? What did she know?") !!!
DeleteGood examples all.
ReplyDeleteThe first one that comes to mind is Ruth Galloway of the Elly Griffith books. She's certainly not a peripheral character, and her mothering style is not our modern picture of perfection. But she's doing a very good job with Kate. From Kate's birth I've been intrigued at how different Ruth is as mother as opposed to Ruth digging up bones. It's a nice contrast.
Maybe my favorite mother of all time is a cat. Mehitabel, in Don Marquis's ARCHIE AND MEHITABEL. I read these years ago, and, even still, hardly a day passes when one line or another doesn't come to me.
“Life is one damned kitten after another." Mehitabel the Alley Cat”
― Don Marquis
My mother used to put that all the time!
DeleteLove these suggestions--keep them coming!
ReplyDeleteI guess I'd never thought about mother's being peripheral in fiction. I love Triss Stein's Brooklyn series, where the protagonist is the mother of a teenage girl. Vicki Thompson's long running midwife adopts a girl to become a mother. And of course Hallie's (non-series) mothers in You'll Never Know Dear. I haven't written a mother protagonist - yet - but my midwife Rose Carroll might be on her way to becoming one in a couple of books!
ReplyDeleteGah. Mothers, not mother's. (Pet peeve, can't believe I mistyped it...)
DeleteWhy, thank you Edith. What a nice Mother's Day surprise. Triss
DeleteHappy Mother's Day to all, no matter how you came to mothering! I'm going to pick a character who never quite made it to motherhood--Helen Lynley would have made a wonderful mother in Elizabeth George's mysteries. She's emblematic of how often motherhood is viewed as something problematic in fiction--especially mystery series--often she's relegated to the background--the interfering mother, the comic sidekick, or killed off. So, it's wonderful when you see a character like Deborah's Gemma, or Rhys's Molly, become a mother. And Julia's Clare--well, I think we can all guess that Clare's not going to become a peripheral character in Miller's Kill!
ReplyDeleteHappy Mother's Day to all!
ReplyDeleteI would have to say that my favorite fictional mother is Ingeborg in Lauraine Snelling's wonderful Red River Series. Although she started out as a step-mother I don't think any of her children truly realized that. Maybe she was almost too good to be true but I can't think of a stronger woman in fiction.
Katherine Hall Page's Faith Fairchild manages to raise babies and toddlers while sleuthing and cooking. I remember Faith's catering business includes a playroom area for her kids.
ReplyDeleteYes!
DeleteYes!
DeleteJenn, since you mentioned Stephanie Plum I want to add her grandmother. She's such a hoot!
ReplyDeleteI think the grandmother's my favorite character in that series. So funny!
DeleteGrandma Mazur! Ilove her, too!
DeleteGrandma Mazur is a hoot!
DeleteI would say Jackie in Stepmom who becomes friend with Isabel ( her ex-husband girl friend) when she learns that she has a terminal cancer ; all for the good of her children. Susan Sarandon and Julia Roberts are very good in this film.
ReplyDeleteKate Collins's Flower Shop series has a wonderful mother in it. Abby Knight's mother is a little dotty, but she is an excellent mom, and an art teacher who comes up with crazy craft ideas. She cheerfully deals with living with a partially paralyzed former policeman husband, who was shot in the line of duty.
ReplyDeleteOther than Mrs. Knight, most of the peripheral mother characters that come to mind are offstage, tragically cut short in the prime of their lives, or evil in some ways, or at least interfering annoyances. That is often true in movies, too. Children's books are more likely to have a dead or disappeared mother than to have a loving mama; I once read a long article or essay about this, how it's a childhood fantasy, or some nonsense.
One of Keenan Powell's books has an assortment of Native Alaskan mothers and strong, almost heroic, mother figures that intrigued me.
Happy Mother's Day to all!
Well, I was thinking of Anne of Green Gables too, but not Anne as Mother.
ReplyDeleteI think Marilla is one of literature's best mother portrayals. Not goopy, not a monster.
She sure didn't take that job on willingly. She wanted a hired hand, not a daughter. But she set her hand to it because, as Matthew said, "Perhaps WE could be of some use to HER." She remains pretty acerbic, but she is the mother every orphan could use.
Absolutely agree on Marilla!
DeleteAgreement from me too.You'd have to end up loving Marilla, as Anne did
DeleteI think the dead-mother or evil-stepmother-mother from classic Disney grows out of the fairy tale tradition: orphaned child manages to survive despite lost parents. You see it in Cinderella, Snow White, and on into Little Lord Fauntleroy and The Little Princess. The Wizard of Oz. Ann of Green Gables. My favorite modern novel about a mother is Stone Diaries. It's the story of an ordinary woman and astonishingly won the 1995 Pulitzer Prize for fiction and the National Book Critics Circle Award. If you haven't read it, treat yourself this mother's day.
ReplyDeleteIt does take a bit of thinking to come up with good examples of mothers in the forefront, but you've come up with some great examples. In the mystery world, two of my favorites are Gemma and Molly. I'm sure I'll be adding Clare to the list, as she's already one of my favorite characters. Someone mentioned Ruth Galloway and I concur -- another great choice. I'd also add Leslie Meir's Lucy Stone. She juggles raising four children with going back to school, then a career, and solving mysteries. The descriptions of her growing family life are some of my favorite parts of the books. Also, Margaret Maron's Deborah Knott becomes a first-rate stepmother, with realistic portrayals of the struggles of that role. I would also add Alexander McCall Smith's Precious Ramstowe to the list!
ReplyDeleteI was hoping someone else would have remembered Deborah Knott. She managed (in a realistic way) to overcome the stepmother stigma and become a really good mom.
DeleteI can't believe I left out Ruth Galloway!! Loving these other examples, though, and putting some on my list!
ReplyDeleteThe first one that comes to mind, outside of characters created by the Reds, is Meg Langslow in Donna Andrews’ great series. Oh, and then there is Rina Lazarus, a mother and stepmother in Faye Kellerman’s Peter Decker/Rina Lazarus series. And China Bayles, who eventually becomes mom to a stepson and to a niece, from Susan Wittig Albert’s series.
ReplyDeleteDebRo
Katie Nolan in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. Strong, determined but such a soft spot for her husband.
ReplyDeleteDonis Casey's Alafair Tucker Mystery series. She is mother to 10 on an Oklahoma Farm beginning in 1910, plus added in-laws and grandchildren as the series progresses. Must read if you are looking for a fully developed mother. Love gives her teeth and claws. It makes her dangerous. It makes her a remarkable sleuth(from http://www.doniscasey.com/?page_id=535)
ReplyDeleteThanks, darlin'!
DeleteGemma, of course, and Ruth, and Deborah Knott. How about Gail Bowen's Joanne Kilbourne. who deftly juggles a substantial career, three kids, and then an adopted daughter? Craig Rice has a delightful, absent-minded author/mother in Home Sweet Homicide.
ReplyDeleteAnd just one more, Daisy Dalrymple, created in Carola Dunn's series, as step-mother to Belinda Fletcher and in loco mater to her nephew Derek. These two have active roles in finding bodies and solving mysteries with Daisy. And, of course, her and Alec's twins whose Nanny must be managed.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite mom is the one on Malcolm in the Middle. A working mom, slightly crazed, mothering those kids and her husband, usually at the top of her lungs. One favorite episode had her dragging the whole family off to a museum. When asked why, "because I have coupons!"
ReplyDeleteFirst came to mind is Sarah, from Patricia MacLachlan's Sarah Plain and Tall (1986 Newbery Winner). Then I thought about J.D. Robb's Dr. Charlotte Mira, and Delia Peabody. I would happily adopt Dr. Mira as my mom in need. Delia, while not a mom, as yet, does a lot of subtle nurturing for our prickly Eve Dallas.
ReplyDeleteLaurien Berenson's character has two sons as well as a bunch of poodles. Victoria Thompson's Sarah has an adopted daughter. Many sleuths have feisty mothers and grandmothers such as Carolyn Hart's Max. Laurel is a force of nature.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Ruth Galloway being one of my favorite fictional mothers. She has always treated Kat not just as a child, but as a person, too. She respects Kate's intelligence, as that is something important about her self she wants respected. She doesn't push her into believing or feeling things. She accepts Kate for Kate. She's not trying to mold her into anything. And, she lets her have a relationship with her father despite the heartache it sometimes causes Ruth.
ReplyDeleteDebs, your Gemma is also a favorite mother who allows her and Duncan's children to be who they are and want to be, who encourages their interests, like ballet, whether male or female. Like Ruth, Gemma doesn't over-mother. She allows her children space and doesn't hover, but will, of course, be there in a heartbeat whenever needed. And, Gemma's combining of yours, mine, and ours into a successful, loving family (with some help from Duncan, of course) is a tribute to her parenting skills. I always get such a warm feeling from this family.
I know they're both surrogates for David Copperfield, but I've always been partial to the Peggoty/Aunt Betsy Trotwood combo.
ReplyDeleteHappy Mother's Day in whatever form :-)
ReplyDeleteGreat post! Reading this post, I was reminded of a song "Why are there no mothers in Disney stories?"
Off the top of my head, I think of Helen Capshaw, mother of Jules Capshaw in the Bakeshop mysteries by Ellie Alexander. And Isabel Dalhousie in the Alexander McCall Smith novels is a late in life mother and she is amazing. Precious Ramstowe from Ladies No. 1 Detective Agency is an adoptive mother. I am starting to see more novels with mothers.
And Mrs. Weasley from the Harry Potter stories is a very busy mother, trying to take care of her brood!
Diana