This is my first post since I finished the ordered part of this series. I pay homage to some of the greatest most formidable female protagonists in science fiction because I like to read about them. With these it is 130 adorable ladies and I have a few more lined up I will write about as soon as I get five to fill a post.

I am open to suggestions on protagonists to write about but check characters or authors first.

The index page contains all the authors and characters but you have to give me until later to find these there. There is also a timeline with the characters sorted by decade. You can also peek at my list of unread females and an afterword to the first 125 with my personal top lists.

1. Zoheret – Seedling (Pamela Sargent)
2. Eva Forge – Last Paladin (Tim Akers)
3. Leal Hieronyma Maspeth – Unraveler of Truth (Karl Schroeder)
4. Kristin Bjornsen – Freedom Champion (Anne McCaffrey)
5. Neela Cord – Caretaker (Dani Kollin & Eytan Kollin)

Zoheret – Seedling

Book: Earthseed (1983)
Series: Seed
Author: Pamela Sargent
Genre: Young Adult | Generation Ship | Coming-of-Age
Publisher: Tor

This is a wonderful YA about Zoheret, born in an artificial womb, raised by Ship and who has to learn the hard way what it is to be human. This is part of the Seed series and Earthseed is book one. Book two Farseed has a different protagonist even if Zoheret features in it as an adult. Book three Seed Seeker is released November 9 in the US, no release date in the UK so far.

Deep within its core, Ship carries the seed of humankind. Sent into space to fulfil the final destiny of the human race, all of Earth’s brightest hopes are in the genetic material stored aboard Ship. Now, over a century later, Ship has created Zoheret and her shipmates from its genetic banks. It has found a home for its children on an uninhabited, earth like planet, but its passengers are not ready to leave – what do they really know of living on a hostile, open surface, alone and unaided by the living machine that has been mother, father, and teacher for all their lives? To prepare them, Ship devises a “survival test.” Suddenly, instincts that have been latent for over one hundred years take over. Zoheret watches friends become strangers – strangers and enemies. Can Zoheret and her companions overcome the biggest obstacle to the survival of the human race-themselves?

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Eva Forge – Last Paladin

Books: The Horns of Ruin (2010)
Author: Tim Akers
Genre: Steampunk | New Weird | Noir | Noird
Publisher: Pyr

Eva Forge sounds like a wonderful character and thanks to Blogger Mad Hatter I can even offer an interview with her. Tim is new to me, this will be the first I read by him. You might want to read Mad Hatters interview with Eva or his review. I have to wait until after the official release next week to get it.

Eva Forge is the last Paladin of the God of War Morgan. The problem is he is long dead from his brother’s hands Amon. This leaves only the last brother immortal Alexander as the last living god in charge of the city of Ash and its surrounding areas. As Paladin Eva is entrusted with the security and protection of the Cult of Morgan and its followers. Not an easy thing for just one person, but with sword and magicked gun she soldiers on with loose lips and a hothead attitude. While on a mission to take the leader of her order somewhere and back some craziness with zombies of a sort goes down and she must track down one of her own.

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Leal Hieronyma Maspeth – Unraveler of Truth

Books: The Sunless Countries
Series: Virga
Author: Karl Schroeder
Genre: Post-Singularity Steampunk
Publisher: Tor

Leal is a somewhat unlikely hero. The novel explores collaboration with the enemy, research and adventures among air nomads in the sunless countries and unravels truths about the wonderful Virga world that Karl Schroeder has created. The last remnants of humanity lives in a gigantic sphere filled with air and an artificial sun in the middle with a beacon that keeps technology out. People lives in rotating colonies and travels in airships. The whole series is wonderful and I will soon start a little review series with all four of them. Leal is a scientist in a city that is about to turn its back towards it at a point their whole world is threatened.

In an ocean of weightless air where sunlight has never been seen, only the running lights of the city of Pacquaea glitter in the dark. One woman, Leal Hieronyma Maspeth, history tutor and dreamer, lives and dreams of love among the gas lit streets and cafes. And somewhere in the abyss of wind and twisted cloud through which Pacquaea eternally falls, a great voice has begun speaking. As its cold words reach even to the city walls – and as outlying towns and travellers’ ships start to mysteriously disappear – only Leal has the courage to try to understand the message thundering from the distance. Even the city’s most famous and exotic visitor, the sun lighter and hero named Hayden Griffin, refuses to turn aside from his commission to build a new sun for a foreign nation. He will not become the hero that Leal knows the city needs; so in the end, it is up to her to listen, and ultimately reply, to the worldwasp.

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Kristin Bjornsen – Freedom Champion

Books: Freedom’s Landing (1995), Freedom’s Choice (1996), Freedom’s Challenge (1998), Freedom’s Ransom (2002)
Series: Catteni
Author: Anne McCaffrey
Genre: Space Opera
Publisher: Ace, Corgi, Bantam UK, Bantam, Putnam

It was a while I read these. Kristin is a strong woman with an interesting sex life if I remember correctly. The Catteni keep humans as slaves. Kristin escapes but helps an injured Catteni revealing her fugitive status. The relationship between Kristin and Zainal, a renegade Catteni is central to this story about liberation
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Neela Cord – Caretaker

Books: The Unincorporated Man (2009), The Unincorporated War (2010), The Unincorporated Woman (Summer 2011)
Series: The Unincorporated Man
Authors: Dani Kollin & Eytan Kollin
Genre: Space Opera
Publisher: Tor

Dr Neela Harper is caretaker of the first unincorporated man to be unfrozen and in book one they try to overcome the obstacles in the way of their relationship. It is also a great book with a big idea. I am currently reading The Unincorporated War. A review will follow shortly.

In a world in which humans themselves have become incorporated and most people no longer own a majority of themselves, one man – owned by no one and owning no one – dares to fight those who’d enslave him. Exiled and hunted, Justin Cord must now lead a revolution in order to birth a nation.

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