Mother's Day

While festivals honoring mothers and mother goddesses date to ancient times, a version of an official Mother’s Day has been around since the Middle Ages. It was customary to allow those who had moved away to visit their mothers in their home parishes on Laetare Sunday, the fourth Sunday of lent, which became Mothering Sunday in Britain. The modern day form of the holiday originated here in the U.S. and has been adopted widely around the world.

The first Mother’s Day was held on May 12, 1907 in Grafton, West Virginia. It quickly became a success, celebrated in nearly every state within five years, and was made a national holiday by President Woodrow Wilson in 1914. (https://www.britannica.com/topic/Mothers-Day)

In honor of Mother’s Day, coming up next weekend on Sunday, May 10th, here are some of the most entertaining mothers in print.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
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“You-will-never-touch-our-children-again!” A doting and devoted mother, Molly Weasley is the center around which the Weasley universe revolves. A generous soul, she takes on Harry Potter as if he were her own. Their means may be limited, but the children never go without food in their bellies, a warm hug, and a gift now and then. But that’s not all. She is a powerful witch who can take on formidable opponents, especially if her kids are threatened. Now that’s a supermom!

Motherest by Kristen Iskandrian

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(amazon) Marrying the sharp insights of Jenny Offill with the dark humor of Maria Semple, Motherest is an inventive and moving coming-of-age novel that captures the pain of fractured family life, the heat of new love, and the particular magic of the female friendship--all through the lens of a fraying daughter-mother bond.

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
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The Carters are a modern fictional family, and Lisa is the glue that holds them together. Lisa got pregnant as a teenager and dealt with her mother’s rejection. A nurse, she raised her children, Starr and Sekani, to be strong and well-aware of the racial injustice of their neighborhood and the world they live in. She’s forged a strong marriage despite her husband’s incarceration and affair, and she treats Seven, the product of that affair, with love. The Hate U Give is a story of strength in the face of adversity, and Lisa is one of the strongest characters in Garden Heights.

The Island of Sea Women by Lisa See
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If your mom loves to lose herself in big, epic novels along the lines of The Queen of the Night or Pachinko that she can lose herself in, she'll love See's latest, The Island of Sea Women, about two friends working in their Korean village's all-female diving collective. Their bond is tested as they come of age against a backdrop of war, social change, and technological advancements. What's even cooler: See based her novel on a real place, Jeju, where men take care of children while women work as divers. This is a novel about women who are strong as your own mom.

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
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ebook in the National Emergency Library

“Watch and pray dear, and never get tired of trying, and never think it is impossible to conquer your fault” Let’s start with the gold standard of literary motherhood – Margaret March, affectionately called Marmee by her daughters. She is the ideal mother – kind, endearing, compassionate and everything nice. A highly principled and charitable woman, she is never too busy to gently guide her daughters. She provides them the emotional strength they need to endure the pains of growing up. She is poor; she is hard working, yet she never encourages her daughters to marry for money. All in all, she is everything a mother is expected to be.

The Color of Water by James McBride
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ebook in the National Emergency Library

When James McBride started writing his memoir, I don’t think he knew the way the world would fall in love with his mother. The book is told in two narratives: McBride tells his story about the struggles he faced growing up black with a white mom, and Ruth tells her story growing up Jewish in the South. I’m breaking the mold here and choosing a non-fictional mom, but if you’ve read this book you know just how touching Ruth is. She raised twelve children, mostly by herself. She had no family to rely on other than her husband’s and their children. If ever there was a super-mom, she was Ruth McBride.

Room by Emma Donoghue
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ebook/eaudio on your Hoopla app
streaming movie on your Kanopy app

Ma  and 5 year old Jack live in an 11 foot by 11 foot room.  Ma sacrifices everything for her son so they can escape from “room” and have a chance at a normal life. Despite her abduction and abuse, Ma is able to create a world for her son and does everything in her power to make that world a better place.  

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
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ebook in the National Emergency Library

“You take delight in vexing me. You have no compassion for my poor nerves.” This constantly irritated, perpetually annoyed mother of five daughters would feature on any list on the subject of memorable mothers. She might be an utter embarrassment to her family with her frivolous nature and alarmingly loud voice, but she is certainly not forgettable to the reader. Mrs. Bennett embodies a style of motherhood diametrically opposite to that of Marmee March. She is a social climber and would rather have her daughters marry a rich man than be happy with someone who understands them. I suppose she loves her daughters in her own way, but trying to push them into inconvenient marriages is an odd way of showing it, don’t you think?

If I Stay by Gayle Forman

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ebook in the National Emergency Library

Everyone needs a mom that will keep them over-caffeinated and bear with them through the early years of playing an instrument. Gayle Forman writes Kat as an awesome rocker mom to a cello-playing teenager. Their personalities couldn’t be more opposite, but they couldn’t have a closer relationship. It’s so clear in every page that Kat supports any and every decision Mia makes. Go to Juliard or stay in Portland with your boyfriend? Most moms would say “you’re going to college” but not Kat. Not many moms would slap noise cancelling headphones onto their baby and bring them into a rock concert, but it is this that makes Kat so special. Her unconditional love for her children mixed with her desire to treat them like small adults qualifies her for fictional mom of the year.

The Museum of Extraordinary Things by Alice Hoffman
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ebook in the National Emergency Library

Coralie Sardie is raised by a terrible father and trained from a young age to work as a mermaid in his coney island “museum”.  Coralie is all but ignored by her father and is raised by the family maid, Maureen.  Once again, this mother figure provides Coralie with the strength to pursue her own dreams and live her life in her own extraordinary way.

Bleak House by Charles Dickens
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ebook in the National Emergency Library

“Truly I am the worst mother of all time! How can you forgive me, child? Yet we cannot see each other again!” With the haughty and distant personality she presents to the world and an explosive secret to hide, Lady Honoria Dedlock is an emotionally divided woman. But the reader soon realizes she is far from being a snob. Three things define her – a great passion, a broken heart and an illegitimate child she loves deeply and will die to protect from the judgment of society. When Esther falls ill, Lady Dedlock is clearly distraught. She disguises herself and goes around trying to get information about her daughter. She could have been a good mother, but her circumstances are unfortunate. However, she is one character that doesn’t easily fade from memory.

The Matriarch: Barbara Bush and the Making of an American Dynasty by Susan Page
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Susan Page, the award-winning Washington bureau chief for USA Today, details the unbelievable life of the former First Lady, and what it was like to be wife to one president and mother to another.  

Becoming by Michelle Obama

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The former First Lady tells her life story, from her growing up on Chicago's South Side to her journey to the White House. If your mom is so inclined, you can opt for the audiobook and let your mom listen to Obama read it in her own voice.

Tell Me More by Kelly Corrigan

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Are there certain words and phrases that create strong relationships? In this collection of essays from Kelly Corrigan, she reflects on 12 phrases that connect us as humans—from “Tell Me More,” to “I Was Wrong.” Your mom will love Corrigan’s musings on marriage and motherhood, and she will find the essay is poignant, funny, and filled with warmth.

Where’d You Go, Bernadette? by Maria Semple

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Bernadette is an unlikely mother to make the list.  She leaves her daughter and husband temporarily and goes on a hunt to find where her mother has gone.  This is a book about mother-daughter relationships. Forcing her daughter to become a little more independent and simultaneously doing something for her self, this is an oddly touching tale.

Fierce Kingdom by Gin Phillips
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(amazon) The zoo is nearly empty as Joan and her four-year-old son soak up the last few moments of playtime. They are happy, and the day has been close to perfect. But what Joan sees as she hustles her son toward the exit gate minutes before closing time sends her sprinting back into the zoo, her child in her arms. And for the next three hours—the entire scope of the novel—she keeps on running.

Using your Kanopy app, watch the 2-part series "Moms" from filmmakers Louis Alvarez & Andrew Kolker, a series from The Center for New American Media presenting mothers from all walks of life speaking amusingly and movingly, without sentimentality, about what it's like to have kids. 

Hoopla also has movies about moms and families of all kinds.

SOURCES

https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/holidays/mothers-day/g23793799/books-for-moms/
https://www.financialexpress.com/lifestyle/literary-mum-unforgettable-mothers-from-the-world-of-fiction/1575503/
https://bookstr.com/article/five-times-we-found-the-best-moms-in-books/
https://www.beyondthebookends.com/2017/05/12/14-best-literary-moms/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/blog/the-10-best-moms-in-fiction/
https://www.realsimple.com/holidays-entertaining/holidays/mothers-day/books-for-mom?slide=6953d0ff-c7ef-4119-82a1-ed10e6d67b14#6953d0ff-c7ef-4119-82a1-ed10e6d67b14