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Savage Daughters of the Secret Isle
The mainlands burn witches.
The Secret Isle shelters them.
Rowen is the Secret Isle’s greatest defender. Together with the other talented women who make up the illegal community, she sinks any ship that approaches, allowing only the witches who survive the wrecks to join them. When a ship full of men arrives on their shore—damaged, but intact—Rowen doesn’t understand how it got through.
Now the community is faced with a choice. Do nothing and risk discovery, or directly confront the violence they must commit to survive, by murdering the men who have sought safety in their harbour.
But the ship reminds Rowen of her own wreck—of the life she was forced to leave behind when she was lucky to be banished for her talent instead of sent to a pyre. If they sink it, Rowen’s potential link to the outside world—and her chance to discover how the men evaded her—will go down with the ship.
The Secret Isle shelters them.
Rowen is the Secret Isle’s greatest defender. Together with the other talented women who make up the illegal community, she sinks any ship that approaches, allowing only the witches who survive the wrecks to join them. When a ship full of men arrives on their shore—damaged, but intact—Rowen doesn’t understand how it got through.
Now the community is faced with a choice. Do nothing and risk discovery, or directly confront the violence they must commit to survive, by murdering the men who have sought safety in their harbour.
But the ship reminds Rowen of her own wreck—of the life she was forced to leave behind when she was lucky to be banished for her talent instead of sent to a pyre. If they sink it, Rowen’s potential link to the outside world—and her chance to discover how the men evaded her—will go down with the ship.
195 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 30, 2025
About the author
J. Patricia Anderson
3 books66 followersJ. Patricia Anderson is a Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy author. Her debut High Fantasy novel DAUGHTERS OF TITH came out in May 2023.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
November 29, 2025
I thoroughly enjoyed this novella. Similar to Your Blood and Bones, J.P does an amazing job crafting a very detailed and interesting world in 150 pages.
Not much I can say without spoilers, but my favorite aspect was how the women on the island’s level of extremism and temperament was relative to how much prejudice they experienced, with the older witches favoring to just kill everyone while the younger witches look for a more diplomatic resolution. Everyone is rational based on their own experiences. Not sure if it was intentional but I really appreciated the insight on how extreme prejudice plants the seeds for future prejudice and violence.
Great stuff, and there is a giant sea monster so that’s an auto 5stars for me
Not much I can say without spoilers, but my favorite aspect was how the women on the island’s level of extremism and temperament was relative to how much prejudice they experienced, with the older witches favoring to just kill everyone while the younger witches look for a more diplomatic resolution. Everyone is rational based on their own experiences. Not sure if it was intentional but I really appreciated the insight on how extreme prejudice plants the seeds for future prejudice and violence.
Great stuff, and there is a giant sea monster so that’s an auto 5stars for me
January 28, 2026
Originally posted on Before We Go Blog!: https://beforewegoblog.com/review-sav...
J. Patricia Anderson’s Daughters of Tith and Your Blood and Bones both impressed me with their smart worldbuilding, enchanting prose, and philosophical underpinnings, so Anderson’s third venture, Savage Daughters of the Secret Isle had a lot to live up to. Like Anderson’s horror-tinged, folktale-informed Your Blood and Bones, SDotSI is a novella, though for readers nervous about anything horror-related, I can reassure that in tone and subject matter, it has much more in common with Anderson’s epic fantasy work. Combining a LeGuinian use of the speculative to explore feminist philosophical themes with N. K. Jemisin’s incisive and clever worldbuilding, Savage Daughters of the Secret Isle blends the best of Anderson’s previous work while creating something startlingly new.
Savage Daughters of the Secret Isle is set in a secondary world in which magical ability has historically marked women as suspect and dangerous, and which has oppressed them violently over hundreds of years. While men with an affinity for magic have occasionally also been the subject of restriction (forbidden to marry or sire children, lest they pass on their talents, for example), they frequently retain a degree of power and respect that women do not, including access to higher learning and knowledge of more powerful magics. Witches—in contrast to wizards—have been burned, slaughtered, and exiled. Indeed, the dichotomy here mirrors to some degree real-world historical contrasts between licit and illicit forms of magic that were believed in during Europe and America’s Early Modern period, as well as how political power has historically been divided along gendered lines. SDotSI‘s story takes place not within the highly misogynistic society of the wider world, however, but outside it. On the shores of the titular Secret Isle, a community of magically-gifted women practices their arts in secret, living free lives with an emphasis on mutual respect, mutual support, and personal freedom. In many ways, SDotSI‘s worldbuilding literalizes folklorist Margaret Murray’s erroneous identification of a widespread historical witch cult in Europe, imagining a utopian, feminist version of the same. Denizens of the Secret Isle have found her shores in a variety of ways over many years, but the community remains small enough that there are concerns about its longevity. Protected by a sea monster that is controlled by one of the witches, many of the island’s inhabitants, including protagonist Rowan, were shipwrecked on the island’s shores. These wrecks have helped the island to remain hidden, with men typically left to drown. Rowan’s own magical affinity is for the ocean, and it is thanks in part to her talents that the community is able to sink ships. When a ship wrecks against the shores of the Secret Isle, but its magically-empowered wizard protects it, however, the community of women is forced to question the ethics of killing the survivors. Matters are complicated further when the ship turns out to be transporting a young woman with abilities similar to Rowan’s own. In the wake of the wizard’s survival, Rowan becomes increasingly tormented by the pressure to kill him, plagued by nightmares of her own drowned father and the mother and sister left behind.
Although I enjoyed Rowan as a character, SDotSI is very much a work focused on ideas, and it is for this reason that I would highly recommend it to fans of LeGuin, and particularly the LeGuin of The Dispossessed. Following the initial shipwreck, around the first half of the novella deals with the witches’ debates over how to deal with the unexpected survivors, as well as the overarching question of whether it is ever possible to truly retreat from the world (and whether one has an ethical responsibility not to). Since the witches themselves have come to the island at different points in time, they each come with their own experiences and baggage. While older members of the community, for instance, may have experienced gender-based violence at its most brutal, those like Rowan who are younger and grew up in a less violent world—or another girl named Parmenti, who was born on the island—may have limited memories or knowledge of oppression. Rowan and those like her therefore tend to express greater mercy than older community members, and she and Parmenti are considered “soft” by many of the other women. Without spoiling the details, at its most effective, SDotSI asks us to consider what different forms of activism can look like, when different approaches are needed, and what members of marginalized and oppressed groups who may have escaped oppression owe to those left behind.
One of the subjects Anderson tackles best is the question of isolationism. While hiding the island has been necessary in order for the women to survive and thrive, cutting themselves off from the rest of the world has repercussions both at a societal and personal level. More powerful magics that the older witches know to exist are inaccessible to them, while on a more intimate note, Rowan laments the loss of her extended family and feels guilty for the challenging lives she suspects her widowed mother and orphaned sister must have experienced. For all that Savage Daughters is a fantasy, it’s wrestling with questions and ideas that feel immediate and real. Though magic may not exist in our world as it does in SDotSI’s, misogyny certainly does, and Anderson tackles many real-world feminist issues alongside the speculative ones. The choices Anderson’s characters make are very narratively and personally satisfying, and though I won’t spoil them here, they do a great job asserting a clear position without coming off in any way as preachy or simplistic.
At the line level, Anderson’s prose ranges from the lush and poetic (Your Blood and Bones), to the restrained yet resonant (Daughters of Tith). Savage Daughters most resembles Daughters of Tith stylistically, privileging readability while reserving more evocative language for particularly momentous events and emotional moments. The writing here is clear and flows well, allowing the themes and subject matter of the novella to take centre stage. Nonetheless, Anderson always writes natural landscapes beautifully, and that remains true in Savage Daughters. Lyricism emerges at critical moments, but also lends the Secret Isle itself a grace that paints a vivid picture.
My own personal favourite moments in the novella arrive in its second half, when Rowan and her community come in closer contact with the ship and its occupants. The urgency introduced by the initial shipwreck returns here with a vengeance, as the planning and fretting of the witches rubs up against forces and people they can’t control. This development is mirrored in Rowan herself, who, the more she agonizes over the ship, begins to remember increasingly uncomfortable details about her own traumatic shipwreck, and to wrestle with issues of survivor’s guilt. Despite that Rowan is happy on the island, she nonetheless yearns for something beyond its shores, and separate from the protection of her found family. Her reminiscences here were especially moving, and Anderson’s use of Rowan’s story to underscore the themes she’s built up over the course of the book is highly effective. I will say that, while I didn’t dislike any of the characters, there were a fair number of supporting cast members, and in a short work, there wasn’t time to fully explore most of them. While the large cast felt realistic, naming a few fewer of the witches and emphasizing the personalities and backstories of the most significant might have been more effective given the short page count. Standouts from the supporting cast included Mal, Rowan’s much tougher close friend and somewhat of a surrogate sister and mother, and the witch on the shipwrecked vessel.
With Anderson’s beautiful writing and her considered approach to themes that feel especially relevant today, Savage Daughters is a fine addition to the subgenre of the critical feminist utopia. It manages to address key themes to do with gender and oppression without falling into the trap of essentializing gender, yet is also able to comment on more broadly applicable issues related to activism, safety, and community. I’ve recommended it to fans of LeGuin and Jemisin, as I’ve done with Anderson’s other work, but I’d further add that anyone who loves Jo Walton’s writing—especially her Thessaly trilogy—would do well to pick up Savage Daughters.
J. Patricia Anderson’s Daughters of Tith and Your Blood and Bones both impressed me with their smart worldbuilding, enchanting prose, and philosophical underpinnings, so Anderson’s third venture, Savage Daughters of the Secret Isle had a lot to live up to. Like Anderson’s horror-tinged, folktale-informed Your Blood and Bones, SDotSI is a novella, though for readers nervous about anything horror-related, I can reassure that in tone and subject matter, it has much more in common with Anderson’s epic fantasy work. Combining a LeGuinian use of the speculative to explore feminist philosophical themes with N. K. Jemisin’s incisive and clever worldbuilding, Savage Daughters of the Secret Isle blends the best of Anderson’s previous work while creating something startlingly new.
Savage Daughters of the Secret Isle is set in a secondary world in which magical ability has historically marked women as suspect and dangerous, and which has oppressed them violently over hundreds of years. While men with an affinity for magic have occasionally also been the subject of restriction (forbidden to marry or sire children, lest they pass on their talents, for example), they frequently retain a degree of power and respect that women do not, including access to higher learning and knowledge of more powerful magics. Witches—in contrast to wizards—have been burned, slaughtered, and exiled. Indeed, the dichotomy here mirrors to some degree real-world historical contrasts between licit and illicit forms of magic that were believed in during Europe and America’s Early Modern period, as well as how political power has historically been divided along gendered lines. SDotSI‘s story takes place not within the highly misogynistic society of the wider world, however, but outside it. On the shores of the titular Secret Isle, a community of magically-gifted women practices their arts in secret, living free lives with an emphasis on mutual respect, mutual support, and personal freedom. In many ways, SDotSI‘s worldbuilding literalizes folklorist Margaret Murray’s erroneous identification of a widespread historical witch cult in Europe, imagining a utopian, feminist version of the same. Denizens of the Secret Isle have found her shores in a variety of ways over many years, but the community remains small enough that there are concerns about its longevity. Protected by a sea monster that is controlled by one of the witches, many of the island’s inhabitants, including protagonist Rowan, were shipwrecked on the island’s shores. These wrecks have helped the island to remain hidden, with men typically left to drown. Rowan’s own magical affinity is for the ocean, and it is thanks in part to her talents that the community is able to sink ships. When a ship wrecks against the shores of the Secret Isle, but its magically-empowered wizard protects it, however, the community of women is forced to question the ethics of killing the survivors. Matters are complicated further when the ship turns out to be transporting a young woman with abilities similar to Rowan’s own. In the wake of the wizard’s survival, Rowan becomes increasingly tormented by the pressure to kill him, plagued by nightmares of her own drowned father and the mother and sister left behind.
Although I enjoyed Rowan as a character, SDotSI is very much a work focused on ideas, and it is for this reason that I would highly recommend it to fans of LeGuin, and particularly the LeGuin of The Dispossessed. Following the initial shipwreck, around the first half of the novella deals with the witches’ debates over how to deal with the unexpected survivors, as well as the overarching question of whether it is ever possible to truly retreat from the world (and whether one has an ethical responsibility not to). Since the witches themselves have come to the island at different points in time, they each come with their own experiences and baggage. While older members of the community, for instance, may have experienced gender-based violence at its most brutal, those like Rowan who are younger and grew up in a less violent world—or another girl named Parmenti, who was born on the island—may have limited memories or knowledge of oppression. Rowan and those like her therefore tend to express greater mercy than older community members, and she and Parmenti are considered “soft” by many of the other women. Without spoiling the details, at its most effective, SDotSI asks us to consider what different forms of activism can look like, when different approaches are needed, and what members of marginalized and oppressed groups who may have escaped oppression owe to those left behind.
One of the subjects Anderson tackles best is the question of isolationism. While hiding the island has been necessary in order for the women to survive and thrive, cutting themselves off from the rest of the world has repercussions both at a societal and personal level. More powerful magics that the older witches know to exist are inaccessible to them, while on a more intimate note, Rowan laments the loss of her extended family and feels guilty for the challenging lives she suspects her widowed mother and orphaned sister must have experienced. For all that Savage Daughters is a fantasy, it’s wrestling with questions and ideas that feel immediate and real. Though magic may not exist in our world as it does in SDotSI’s, misogyny certainly does, and Anderson tackles many real-world feminist issues alongside the speculative ones. The choices Anderson’s characters make are very narratively and personally satisfying, and though I won’t spoil them here, they do a great job asserting a clear position without coming off in any way as preachy or simplistic.
At the line level, Anderson’s prose ranges from the lush and poetic (Your Blood and Bones), to the restrained yet resonant (Daughters of Tith). Savage Daughters most resembles Daughters of Tith stylistically, privileging readability while reserving more evocative language for particularly momentous events and emotional moments. The writing here is clear and flows well, allowing the themes and subject matter of the novella to take centre stage. Nonetheless, Anderson always writes natural landscapes beautifully, and that remains true in Savage Daughters. Lyricism emerges at critical moments, but also lends the Secret Isle itself a grace that paints a vivid picture.
My own personal favourite moments in the novella arrive in its second half, when Rowan and her community come in closer contact with the ship and its occupants. The urgency introduced by the initial shipwreck returns here with a vengeance, as the planning and fretting of the witches rubs up against forces and people they can’t control. This development is mirrored in Rowan herself, who, the more she agonizes over the ship, begins to remember increasingly uncomfortable details about her own traumatic shipwreck, and to wrestle with issues of survivor’s guilt. Despite that Rowan is happy on the island, she nonetheless yearns for something beyond its shores, and separate from the protection of her found family. Her reminiscences here were especially moving, and Anderson’s use of Rowan’s story to underscore the themes she’s built up over the course of the book is highly effective. I will say that, while I didn’t dislike any of the characters, there were a fair number of supporting cast members, and in a short work, there wasn’t time to fully explore most of them. While the large cast felt realistic, naming a few fewer of the witches and emphasizing the personalities and backstories of the most significant might have been more effective given the short page count. Standouts from the supporting cast included Mal, Rowan’s much tougher close friend and somewhat of a surrogate sister and mother, and the witch on the shipwrecked vessel.
With Anderson’s beautiful writing and her considered approach to themes that feel especially relevant today, Savage Daughters is a fine addition to the subgenre of the critical feminist utopia. It manages to address key themes to do with gender and oppression without falling into the trap of essentializing gender, yet is also able to comment on more broadly applicable issues related to activism, safety, and community. I’ve recommended it to fans of LeGuin and Jemisin, as I’ve done with Anderson’s other work, but I’d further add that anyone who loves Jo Walton’s writing—especially her Thessaly trilogy—would do well to pick up Savage Daughters.
November 28, 2025
A powerful feminist fantasy that follows in the footsteps of stories like The Gate To Women's Country, Savage Daughters of the Secret Isle manages to be both philosophical and deeply compelling. As is typical of Anderson's work, the characters feel remarkably real and the worldbuilding is superb.
The ending both surprised and delighted me. A highly satisfying tale that will leave you wanting more!
The ending both surprised and delighted me. A highly satisfying tale that will leave you wanting more!
April 10, 2026
A quick, feminist fantasy read, this one's more about characters' inner conflict rather than anything external despite what you might think is coming.
An island of liberated witches find their safety compromised by an inexplicable shipwreck. Not that shipwrecks are uncommon; it's how Rowen and her found family of magically talented women came to be on the isle themselves. It's just that this time it's not a lone witch left afloat, but a party of men. Having struggled to escape a society that looked down on women and could order the death of any woman with magical ability, the witches of the isle have a dilemma on their hands. Rowen wants to keep her people safe, but can she do what needs to be done once she's seen the faces of those she must condemn?
I found this a enjoyabe short read with a hint of the cozy about it. Yes, it has high stakes for the witches, but it's told with compassion and thoughfulness rather than brash action sequences. Rowan's struggles as she comes to understand what keeping their isle secret are often voiced aloud between various other characters, from the wise elders to the hot-headed warrior. It all works for the YA-ish vibes.
A proof read for typos/synonyms would polish it up a bit, but I'd have no reservations recommending it to those in the mood for a feminist (but-not-on-the-nose) story of tough choices and magic.
An island of liberated witches find their safety compromised by an inexplicable shipwreck. Not that shipwrecks are uncommon; it's how Rowen and her found family of magically talented women came to be on the isle themselves. It's just that this time it's not a lone witch left afloat, but a party of men. Having struggled to escape a society that looked down on women and could order the death of any woman with magical ability, the witches of the isle have a dilemma on their hands. Rowen wants to keep her people safe, but can she do what needs to be done once she's seen the faces of those she must condemn?
I found this a enjoyabe short read with a hint of the cozy about it. Yes, it has high stakes for the witches, but it's told with compassion and thoughfulness rather than brash action sequences. Rowan's struggles as she comes to understand what keeping their isle secret are often voiced aloud between various other characters, from the wise elders to the hot-headed warrior. It all works for the YA-ish vibes.
A proof read for typos/synonyms would polish it up a bit, but I'd have no reservations recommending it to those in the mood for a feminist (but-not-on-the-nose) story of tough choices and magic.
March 29, 2026
The simple yet powerful story of a group of women castaway on an island of no return. While some chose this life and others had that life thrust upon them, all have a similar story of how harshly the world outside treated them. All accept the costs of ensuring the continued safety of their community. And yet there comes a time where a dilemma arises...
Through some deftly drawn characters and a deceptively straightforward plot, Anderson leads us to examines the many meanings of freedom and to ask with the protagonist, is it better to reject a flawed society or fight for change from within?
The ending is so truthful and so beautifully written it propelled my rating from a 4 to 5 stars.
Through some deftly drawn characters and a deceptively straightforward plot, Anderson leads us to examines the many meanings of freedom and to ask with the protagonist, is it better to reject a flawed society or fight for change from within?
The ending is so truthful and so beautifully written it propelled my rating from a 4 to 5 stars.
Read
November 22, 2025This is my second standalone fantasy novella! If you're coming from DoT or YBaB you will find it different, but familiar. It was supposed to be published in November last year but you can likely imagine why its release got derailed---a hopeful feminist fantasy in Nov 2024? Impossible. I'm happy to have gone through with publishing it in the end because I, at least, needed this story. Better late than never. I hope you enjoy <3.
September 23, 2026
Marvelous fantasy novella. Devoured this magical snack-size story involving weatherwitches, a sea beast, friendships, unexpected visitors and a polarizing moral dilemma. Enjoyed the story arc of the FMC Rowen. Renya's journey was an interesting element too.
Thank you to the author, the publisher and Goodreads. I was thrilled to win this ebook in a Goodreads giveaway.
Thank you to the author, the publisher and Goodreads. I was thrilled to win this ebook in a Goodreads giveaway.
January 4, 2026
My 2026 reading list is off to a great start! Savage Daughters is a rich and satisfying story. A cast of relatable characters works to resolve a thorny problem. The resolution is kept in question until the final pages, and that unpredictability leads to a rather unexpected ending.
September 30, 2026
#goodreadsgiveaway
Great story. If you love a tale of women fighting back or taking control of their own lives this one is for you. I'm really hoping there will be a book two because I really want to know what happens next.
Great story. If you love a tale of women fighting back or taking control of their own lives this one is for you. I'm really hoping there will be a book two because I really want to know what happens next.
December 12, 2025
A thought provoking work of feminist fantasy fiction.
July 13, 2026
4.5 Great read! Only reason it's not a 5 is the repetitive parts that took me out of the book a little, but it was so minor compared to how great the rest of the book was! Very refreshing.
Did Not Finish
September 22, 2026This wasn’t for me I found the first have very repetitive.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews