The Blazing World

This book is considered one of the oldest written books of science fiction. It is more appropriately considered a prerunner to science fiction and is amazing because it was written by a duchess three and a half centuries ago. The story is about an imaginary kingdom that that can be reached via the North Pole and is the only known work of utopian fiction by a woman in the 17th century. In the story, a young woman enters this other world and becomes the empress of a society composed of various species of talking animals. Her underwater forces of fish men and her fire stone dropping avian allies confront the enemies of the Kingdom of Esfi.