In real life, the Hole-in-the-Wall is a mountain pass in Wyoming where some of America’s most notorious outlaws made their camp - but in Outlawed, those outlaws are now people who have failed to abide by America’s strict new sexual fertility laws. Set in an alternate version of the Old West in which America’s sexual morality has shifted to prioritize fertility rather than chastity, Outlawed tells the tale of a group of hardscrabble gender non-conforming outlaws and their standoff at the legendary Hole-in-the-Wall. It’s an absolute romp and contains basically everything I want in a book: witchy nuns, heists, a marriage of convenience, and a midwife trying to build a bomb out of horse dung.
Here to provide some is the scrappy new feminist Western novel Outlawed by Vox gender reporter Anna North, which has been announced as a Reese’s Book Club pick.
(Jan.Less than two weeks into its run, 2021 is already a year that could use a little joy.
This feminist western parable is impossible to put down. As the novel barrels toward a surprise ending, it’s further strengthened by Ada’s voice and reflections, which preserve a sense of immediacy: “distances that had once seemed vast were now so small that my enemies could cross them in an instant.” The characters’ struggles for gender nonconformity and LGBTQ rights are tenderly and beautifully conveyed. The tense plot takes many turns through Ada’s increasingly violent adventures with the gang, beginning with a botched holdup of a wagon laden with gold. The outlaws plan to create a town where nonconforming people can belong.
Ada becomes a “doctor” to the motley group led by the Kid (to whom no gender pronouns are attributed-“‘Not he, not she,’ Elzy said. After Ada’s former friend has a miscarriage and accuses Ada of casting a spell on her, Ada’s mother helps her flee to a nunnery, where a Sister suggests she join a nearby gang known as Hole in the Wall. Eighteen-year-old newlywed Ada, unable to conceive a child, fears she will be accused of witchcraft, a fate common to the women in her Dakota territory community. North’s knockout latest (after The Life and Death of Sophie Stark) chronicles the travails of a midwife’s daughter who joins a group of female and nonbinary outlaws near the end of the 19th century.
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