3.25

While this is listed as a sequel, it’s really more of a companion novel to The Peacekeeper. It takes place in the same world that never experienced English colonization, but this book takes place in England and other parts of Europe, where The Peacekeeper takes place in what would’ve been the United States.

I think the most interesting part of this series is the exploration of what the world would’ve looked like without English colonization. Here we see England as a backwater island and we see things like the Holy Roman Empire, and Islamic empires that maintained their supremacy. It does make for a jarring experience sometimes because the book takes place in the 1990s and cell phones exist but there’s also a Victorian feel to at least English culture.

This book in particular has more of a thriller feel, than the mystery plot of the first book. There’s a lot of action, and the end of the book in particular is pretty fast paced. That being said, I think the pacing was off and it made the book feel longer than it really was. I also found the ultimate resolution of the plot to be a little disappointing.

That being said, dystopias with emphasis on gender dynamics are not something I tend to enjoy, which I knew going in, but I enjoyed the first book so I hoped that this one would surprise me.

This is a highly derivative and rather boring book that I can't imagine will please many people. It follows closely on Handmaiden's tale and other recent misogynistic takes. Yawn.

A good book that illustrated the plight of women in an alternate world somewhat similar to that of a Handmaid’s tale. If you liked that book, you will like this book. The mystery and twists will keep the reader guessing.

Title: The Mother
Author: B.L. Blanchard
Release Date: May 23rd, 2023
Page Count: 294
Format: Netgalley
Start Date: May 13th, 2023
Finish Date: May 17th, 2023

Rating: 5 Stars

Review:

This book blew my mind. It’s a modern day book, but it’s written as if certain movements never happened. So women are still considered properly. I really enjoyed it. It gives a what would happen if vibe that I really enjoy with books. Especially things like this. What if women never gained equality, but the rest of advancements in society happened. This is the sequel to The Peacekeeper, which is another reimagined story of another level. They can be read as standalone. I still fully recommend reading both. They are more than worth the read.

This was fine. At first I was intrigued by the world building and finding out about this alternate version of England and the world. At first I found the plot line quite well-paced with enough tension, but after a while I started to skim as there was lots of the sister's repeating their feelings about everything and it got a little boring.

I also felt like they kept getting saved from bad situations completely by chance, which just also sucked the tension from everything. I know it's hard to give characters agency in such a setting, but it really started to feel like a lot of their victories weren't earned.

Not bad, but nothing special.

A sequel that fails to measure up to the quality of its predecessor.

The least interesting type of alternate history is the turning of tables. Novels such as The Mirage by Matt Ruff and Through Darkest Europe by Harry Turtledove are just amusing curiosities, with little substance to chew on. It's one thing to show the possible advancement of populations that in our world have been mistreated and exploited, like author B. L. Blanchard did wonderfully in The Peacekeeper; it's another thing to rain all kinds of misfortune upon the populations that in our world have been privileged, like she does in its sequel The Mother.

Both books are nominally set in the same alternate world, where colonization never happened and Europe never sought to rule the world, but the events of one novel don't connect to the other, which means the sequel can be read on its own. In The Mother, we follow Marie, a desperate housewife fleeing an unhappy marriage in a nightmare version of Britain, where the Enlightenment never happened and every nobleman is a miniature Henry VIII, eager to murder his wife if she fails to produce a son. Europe in general is under the grip of Catholic theocracy (the Holy Roman Empire never dissolved), but the novel singles out Britain as the most extreme case, a Taliban regime on steroids where women have no human rights and purity culture is law.

The novel is not without some merit: there's a notable use of cognitive estrangement in showing us these characters behave with the strictest Victorian prudishness in a world of camera phones. The horrors of absolute patriarchy and rigid class segregation in this setting are magnified by modern surveillance technology that lets husbands track their wives' movements on a tablet. The effect is a curious form of disorientation, as if Jane Eyre had taken a wrong turn through Stepford and crashed into Gilead. And, to the novel's credit, this is not too far from certain alarming #tradwife trends in the real world. However, beyond the shock value of presenting us with a whole continent held in a protofascist iron grip, The Mother doesn't have much in the way of statements of its own to make. We already know patriarchy is bad, and classism is bad, and theocracy is bad. We've already received the news from Iran and Saudi Arabia. We don't need to hear it again.

In terms of speculative content, The Mother is a rehash of every sexist dystopia. In terms of literary achievement, it doesn't rise above misery porn. In terms of structure, its plot is sustained by contrived chance encounters. By the middle of the book, it's become an established pattern: our protagonist is in a desperate situation, all hope seems lost, and suddenly, out of nowhere, a character who can save her enters the scene. Even the climax of the story hinges on this device—four times. Besides this narrative vice, the dialogues sound artificial, at times overly melodramatic and at times transparently expository. When characters lament to each other about the sad state of the world, they often recite lists of factoids that only the reader needs to hear. And the all too frequent flashbacks needlessly spell out the emotional stakes that were already clear from previous scenes, sometimes recounting the exact same events, as if the author didn't trust her first telling of them.

It's hard to believe that The Mother comes from the same author who wrote the immeasurably better The Peacekeeper. However, this drop in quality is less surprising upon revisiting the clichés that populate the ending of The Peacekeeper. If Blanchard intends to continue this series, one must hope she returns to the ignored places where the change in history brought better fortunes instead of indulging even further in doom and gloom.



Nerd Coefficient: 4/10.

First off, I want to thank NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for an e-ARC of this novel.

Oh. My. Goodness. There were so many twists and turns in this book and I absolutely loved every minute of it.

Reading the summary of this novel, I was expecting something along the lines of The Handmaid's Tale, which I wasn't a huge fan of (due to Atwood's writing style). While The Mother followed the same general concept of a dystopian society where women are treated as though they are worthless unless they can mother a son, it was different in its own way. I really liked the alternative history idea of England being a small country, and not the conquerers of so many other small countries and how far some of the characters are willing to go to avoid scandal.

Marie and her sisters are incredibly strong female characters and though the ending felt a little bit rushed, I'm giving this novel 4.75 stars because I feel like it is one everyone should read.

Set in an alternate future where women are forced basically to only reproduce, one woman fakes her death for a chance for a better future. I'd recommend reading the Peacekeepers before this. Although not a sequel, it is set in the same world and it would be easier to understand the context.

The Mother by B.L. Blanchard is a novel that imagines a world where the British Empire never existed, and women are treated as commodities. In this world, women have no autonomy and are forced into marriages for the sole purpose of reproduction. Marie, the Duchess of Suffolk, finds herself in a difficult position when she is deemed useless by her husband and his family due to her infertility. With no other options, she decides to escape and seek a life of freedom.

The novel is a thought-provoking exploration of themes such as oppression, autonomy, and family secrets. The world-building is excellent, and the author has created a believable alternate reality that is both intriguing and frightening. The characters are well-drawn, and Marie's struggles are both heart-breaking and inspiring.

The writing in The Mother is beautiful, with vivid descriptions and poetic language that bring the story to life. The pacing is excellent, with the plot moving along at a brisk pace, and the twists and turns keep the reader engaged. The themes of the novel are relevant and timely, and the story raises important questions about the role of women in society and the power dynamics in relationships.

Overall, The Mother is a powerful and engaging novel that will appeal to fans of dystopian fiction and historical fiction. The author has created a compelling world, and the story is both thought-provoking and entertaining. Highly recommended.

I started this book very open minded, I did like the handmaid tale, and I do like dystopian societies that make my skin crawl, and at first I did like the story of Marie, Emma and Alice, the book is a bit difficult to place, because while reading, I keep imagining women dressed like in the book 80 days around the globe, but they use technology and mobile phones.

My problem with this book starts not in how the women are treated but in how the luck is always smiling to the women of this family… it was like they all belong to the bloodline of Donald duck’s cousin Gaston… nothing ever goes wrong for them… and things go many ways, but in the end all goes well… for you to make an idea, the sisters Marie and Emma are persecuted outside of England and even with the bad guy with eyes on them they manage to put the police on his toes… or when selling the stolen jewels and Marie almost was mugged, it seems that Emma in 10 years levelled up more than 100 levels, but if you want to know more you’ll need to read the book.

Thank you NetGalley and 47North for the free ARC and this is my honest opinion.

I received an arc via Netgalley. The Mother is on sale May, 2023.
The Mother is #2 in the Good Lands series, I have not read the first part.

The story is preceded by Robert Browning's poem My Last Duchess, in which a Duke diatribes on the disgraceful behavior of his Dutchess, he claims she flirted with everyone and did not appreciate his “gift of a nine-hundred-years- old name.”

I think I misunderstood the blurb of the story, because I had a different expectation of the story beforehand.
Because women's autonomy was threatened in an alternate world, I mistakenly assumed a (dystopian) mix between The Handmaid's Tale & Dr Who, but that turned out not to be the case in the end.

The story takes place in an alternative world, where the Holy Roman Empire still exists (i.e. Germany is not yet unified), and where Latin is still the language of communication in large parts of Europe.
I personally found that a bit confusing, even when I read fantasy or sci fi, I want to know a bit about where I am and in which time period. It seems as if the author wanted to add bits and pieces from different times: there is the familiar red telephone booth in Dickensian London, yet all kinds of gadgets seem to be widely available. This alternative world is a patriarchal world, women must give birth to sons, barren wives are beheaded. Women are not allowed to have a phone, a home, and are not allowed to work. They are tagged with a so-called Wifelock.
Marie has been married for many years, but does not bear sons. She is not happy and decides to flee by staging her death. She thinks her mother is still alive and has to get to Zeebrugge illegally, where she thinks a sister Emma must also live.
From the moment Marie is in the Low Countries, the story loses momentum, and becomes a rather simple chase across an alternate Europe. There was a bit too much telling. Via dialogues, the author gives flashbacks and additional information: ‘Women are considered commodities and investments, and dressed up like little dolls'
Through dialogues between Emma and Marie, we get an insight into the world the two ladies live in, however, this does make the dialogues somewhat unnatural, and more or less a mere means to tell more about how and where they live.
I occasionally got the idea that the novel is aimed more at YA readers, and I personally think that the abbreviation FFC doesn’t work for (European) readers. There was a ‘Freie Stadt Frankfurt’, yet FFC can mean so many things, I’d personally skip abbreviations with an ambiguous meaning from any text.
Some aspects are dwelled on too long, others are reported too casually (people suddenly dropping dead. Why?) The story is not balanced throughout, there is too much drama, repetition and focus on silly details, information on other aspects is sometimes missing…
Like I said, I admired parts of the worldbuilding, but I also felt that the writer could have gotten more out of it, as the idea mainly focuses on the position of women. Instead of deepening that, the story merely revolves around a chase, getting caught, with a rather unsatisfactory ending. In my opinion, the story could have been more feminist or reactionary, and I think that the women could have taken a more rigorous stand against the men, instead of fleeing from an unwanted situation.

I now get the impression that I am to witness the squabbling between the sisters, fleeing across an alternate Europe, from their fate that very many women suffer even today.
Finally, there is something of freedom gained at the end, but not because of their own statement/rebellion, but rather because of a family secret that does unravel quite suddenly.
I did find the focus on Church Law and quoting whole books of the Bible a bit odd, and not quite fitting into the story, I get the impression that the writer wants to flaunt her knowledge on certain subjects. At times, there was too much telling and some of the actions came across as too elaborate. ( three pages on how to remove a WifeChip, two more pages on a mindfulness exercise, and too much focus on their terrible fate).
In the end, it was not about (a mother) at all, but more about primogeniture, entailment and the social status of women. Her judgment on her own sex is quite harsh, if Austen had merely portrayed the heroines in her novels as mere broodmares, I seriously wonder if Mr Darcy or a Mr Knightley would have enjoyed any fame at all…..
I find the concept very original, and the execution at times certainly fascinating, but overall I felt much more could have been had from the story; because, at times, I got the feeling that the writer wants to focus on too many themes, which made the story as a whole a bit weak.
Had this not been a review copy, I would probably have got off in Strasbourg.

2.7 - 3 stars.
I would like to thank Netgalley and the publisher for this review copy. I leave this review voluntarily.

I read the author's previous book, and liked it. That one and this one might be considered alternate history stories, and this story is well conceived and executed. Interesting characters and dialog. I look forward to the next one.

I really appreciate the free ARC for review!!

Thanks to 47North and NetGalley for the chance to read and review B.L. Blanchard's 'The Mother.'

Having loved B.L. Blanchard's 'The Peacekeeper' and it's very plausible and thoughtful imagining what an 'America' would look like that had never been invaded by European colonists I was very much looking forward to reading 'The Mother' which takes a similar thematic approach to the same time period and concept for the UK and western Europe where the real-world colonization by those nations never happened.

I'm afraid I was somewhat disappointed.

The same imaginative take on what might have transpired is at play and it's fascinating to think how the author chooses which elements of real-world modern life to retain and which elements of the historical real-world to retain and play up. The UK and western Europe of 'The Mother' are Handmaids Tale-like in their depiction of the plight of women, their dominance by men, and their subjugation by the state and the church. The Catholic Church in this instance since the Reformation never happened. I began by thinking that this was very far fetched but then I realized what's happening around the US with women's rights being eroded - Roe V Wade, the banning of sleeveless tops for women in the Missouri state government this week - and suddenly, that speculative 'present' didn't seem so impossible.

My real disappointment with the book was the plotting - too often major events in the book just happened - this is a society where communication, especially for women, is either very tightly regulated or technically difficult yet people who haven't seen or heard from each for years just seem to drop into each others' laps and on a continent constantly at war or political/ideological struggle these women could travel places with hours and be tracked and caught also within hours or days. Way too much deus ex machina at play for my liking.

The wealth of aristocracy in the UK of 'The Mother' was slowly fading but since those families and properties were, in real life, funded by conquest and the spoils of those colonies it's puzzling to know what was the source of their wealth in this imagined world.

I found 'The Peacemaker' to be an optimistic book and am looking forward to a sequel to that one - and not that every such novel by the author should be optimistic - but I found 'The Mother' to be everything but, despite the supremacy and indomitably of the human and specifically female spirit the alternative present there was largely hopeless and with no real prospect of change. The enlightened criminal justice approach from 'The Peacemaker' is at diametrical odds with Europe of the same imagined period and maybe that's the point?

This is a story of adventure, endurance, of fight, and of love. The Mother is a story with twists, turns, and shocking events you don’t see coming. You feel for the characters when they hurt and you root for them to come out on top. You will not regret picking up this book and reading it. It was a great book.

I would also like to thank the publisher and NetGalley for allowing me to reach this arc.