“Once there was a city of women.

Its rulers were women, as were its judges and advisors. Female architects had laid out its streets and houses, and female masons had raised them. Its army was well provided and well trained, for though the city was isolated, in a remote desert region, it had had enemies in its time. And its arts and sciences flourished. Though there were few reports of anyone having visited the city—few, indeed, who could say in what direction it lay—its productions were well-known. From where else could they have come, the scrolls of poetry, the calligraphy and silk paintings, that circulated among the wealthy and earned exorbitant prices for any merchant lucky enough to get hold of one? Words and images to equal those of the masters, but no master laid claim to them, and where the master’s imprint should be there would appear a woman’s name: Soraya, Noor, Farhat; or an unfamiliar symbol of feather, leaf or flower.”

The Steel Seraglio by Mike Carey, Linda Carey, and Louise Carey