Late to the party here (found the link in a Sounis post) but I love you for this line:
WHY CAN’T STRONG FEMALE HEROES WANT KIDS IS BASICALLY WHAT I WANT TO KNOW.

I'm a fan of more recent books and I'm getting frustrated at the whole "since she's a strong female character she must reject all inherently female activties!" Sometimes it's pulled off well but so many times it feels as if the author just doesn't know their character, although it's been a while since I read Graceling so I forget exactly what I thought about Katsa.