There are some (not many) mainstream books like that. Rumer Godden's China Court is really an exploration of different ways of being a matriarch -- it's five generations of family and the most important character, the one who the text calls Mrs Quin (they're all Mrs Quin...) is the one who starts off as an orphan playing in the garden and ends up passing it on to her granddaughter.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
zvi and
no subject
Date: 2010-02-20 04:44 pm (UTC)