In a dystopian society, a young widow is placed in a holding facility to spend her days learning home economics until she's chosen to be the wife of a new man.

In an alternate universe in 19th century Boston, a single mother commits an act of unnatural cruelty against her son. However, since women are invincible against a man's violence, the wife of an esteemed policeman takes on the task of executing her, only to have second thoughts in the cold gallows.

A Jewish mother wants her daughter to marry well and have a better life, but her husband doesn't seem to care. After her other daughter passes away, she realizes she should not hesitate to make bigger sacrifices.

A working-class mother has held only one hope for her entire life: that one day, her daughter would marry well and wealthy, and take care of her in her old age. When her daughter reveals that the man she loves is not wealthy, her mother's dreams of rest are dashed and divided.

An elderly woman finds herself surrounded by tragedy.

In a rural town, a woman attempts to run away, with her three children, from her abusive husband. While the feat seems straightforward at first, a series of complications causes their escape to become increasingly precarious.

Once fired from her housemaid post with the MacFarland family, whose son she loved deeply, Lula Borrow falls into street-peddling, religious fanaticism, and direly ill health. Lula Borrow barely escapes her abusive husband, whose maltreatment kills one of their two children. Her sole reprieve is a housemaid post with the MacFarland family, whose son she loves deeply, and when she is fired she falls into street-peddling, religious fanaticism, and direly ill health.

The women of a brothel house live under the care of a woman referred to as Mama, while facing the disapproval and disrespect from the public.

In a patriarchal village threatened by demons, Asvi, a widow, takes the sacrificial place of a widowed mother who is too poor to evade becoming a female offering.

In a future society of solely women who have found ways to reproduce and survive after a devastating plague, a young couple and their eldest daughter encounter four human males from Earth, and they anticipate the impending end of their matriarchal society.