Mother's Day

 It was Mother’s Day recently in Australia, and it got me thinking about how very diverse mothers and their individual circumstances can be, and how the characters in Sam’s story that are mothers are all uniquely different. 

Take Vera for instance; she loved her daughter Ana with all her heart, but her twisted beliefs of superstition and folklore thwarted any chance of her being a good mother, and in the end it cost her dearly. Ana on the other hand, despite her unhappy childhood from her own controlling mother, proved to be the complete opposite of the woman who raised her. A compassionate and caring mother, she proved to Sam that despite the years they were kept apart, she never stopped loving him, an unconditional love with no judgement of the choices he made whilst living on the streets.

And then Kate, who found herself in a very difficult and unhappy marriage, gaslit by her husband Patrick for so long that she felt she was going insane. However she still managed to be a good mother to Millie and Evie, strict yet fair and no matter how traumatised and let down by her husband she felt, she did not let this affect the relationship with her girls.

Angela, Danica’s mum is perhaps the most fragile mother in the story. With a weak husband who can’t even support her when Danica arrives home after being attacked, she has to be both mother and father. She is desperately trying to hold onto her only child and hoping she never moves out of the family home. She loves Danica so much that her daughter feels smothered, which isn’t ideal. It begs the question if this situation had a bearing on her relationship with Trent, or choosing to go on a date with Jack in book two. 

This brings me to Hillary. Let down by her first husband Frank who left her penniless due to his gambling addiction, she was a single parent bringing up Patrick until she met her new husband Derek. Patrick grew up to be a challenging son, spoilt and self-serving, and despite her love for him, she was unable to understand his private life, and her disapproval resulted in mother and son being estranged for a time. Yet Hillary proved her devotion to Patrick beyond doubt by hiding his sordid secret, but the actions she took to protect him ultimately cost Derek his life. This showed her unrivalled love for her only son, and she eventually held out an olive branch to Patrick, unable to bear their separation any longer.

Lastly we come to Gloria. How complicated is Gloria? In the first book we see Gloria as a trouble-maker, the self-appointed town gossip that she is proud to be. She knows everyone else’s business and won’t rest until she’s uncovered every single detail. But in the second book, we find out that Gloria is a mother too; it’s complicated as you would expect it to be. Gloria hasn’t had an easy life in the past, and events shed a new light on her persona which may surprise the reader.

There are mothers in the book that only have a passing mention; Trent’s mum who was blessed with the most obnoxious son you can imagine – being a mother to Trent can’t have been easy, brothers Connor and Aaron, Sam’s street friends whose parents were both addicted to drugs, and in book two, Chris and Jack’s mum, a single mother to two boys with a complicated back story.

So being a mother is the hardest job in life, but also the most rewarding. A person who provides unconditional love, safety and support above all else to their child, and would take a knife through the heart to save them from harm – but perhaps that doesn’t apply to everyone… The mothers in my story are an interesting bunch, wouldn’t you agree!

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