The Stolen Women: A Novel

The Stolen Women is a debut queer ancient historical novel that follows a young female warrior as she investigates the disappearance of noble women in her village, as war with Rome looms on the horizon, perfect for readers of Song of Achilles, A Thousand Ships, and Circe.

Safinia is fine to focus on her training as a warrior, providing for her sisters, and minding her own business. She feels no great need to meddle in anyone else's, until women in her town, including her former lover, begin disappearing. Quietly, at first, but disappearing just the same. All of the missing women have vanished from powerful households, but their formidable fathers are in utter denial, claiming their daughters are off on trips, sure to be back shortly, with perfectly reasonable explanations for their absences.

Dissatisfied with the half-hearted attempts to hand wave away the alarming and mysterious cases of the vanishing women, Safinia takes matters into her own hands, embarking on a journey to a neighboring village in search of answers or at the very least clues that might unearth threads she can begin to pull at. Along the way, she meets an unlikely yet helpful search partner, a historian who calls himself Livy. But despite his eerie sense of knowledge, Safinia is unable to uncover to missing women, thwarted more often than not by the girls' fathers themselves. As war with Rome looms on the horizon, Safinia must face the reality that the only one she can trust to bring them home is herself.

Alysandra Dutton has crafted an expertly researched and in-depth look at the Sabine women, one of history's most overlooked yet crucial stories that has inspired countless works of art throughout the centuries. It's a fresh, page-turning adventure, perfect for readers of Madeline Miller and Natalie Haynes.