Swords and Spaceships for May 7: SFF Moms

Queen Talyien of Jin-Sayeng is also know as the She-Wolf—and less flattering, the Bitch-Queen—because she exiled her husband and murdered a man the day before her coronation. But she’s also a mother who loves the son she has with the now-exiled husband, and she’ll do anything to keep him safe.

Technically Shards of Honor is the first Cordelia Vorkosigan book, but this is the one where she becomes a mom. Cordelia is basically the space opera GOAT, someone whose complete self confidence and emotional intelligence let her cut through masculinist BS like a laser cannon through butter. She is a delight in every book.

Vern is a young woman who must flee both her abusive husband and the cult he leads because she’s determined that both she and her babies should have a better life. To protect her family, she undergoes a terrifying, violent metamorphosis… and will have to face the violence in both her personal history and that of her homeland.

This entire series is set off by Essun discovering that her husband has killed their son and kidnapped their daughter, and that sets her off on a world-spanning and world-altering journey to save her surviving child–and maybe ultimately the world.

Ti-Jeanne is a new mother; her child, Baby, is so young that he doesn’t even have a proper name yet. Living in the walled-off center of an abandoned Toronto, she has to face down the crime lord who runs the place while learning to accept her relationship with the spirits from her grandmother, Gros-Jeanne.

Isabella Camhearst is a naturalist making ground-breaking discoveries and studying the dragons of the world, all while being a single mother. She even eventually brings her son along on one of her journeys of discovery.