Who would have thought that Margaret Parker and Hattie LeCour would ever meet, much less become good friends? Margaret, known as Garrett to everyone was born in England and married a nobleman. Hattie was born a slave in America and after that, supported herself in a variety of ways, often as a prostitute. But after Garrett and her husband migrated to the United States, the two women did meet out West. After Garrett's husband died, the women decided to use the ranch Garrett and her husband started as a refuge for women fleeing vicious husbands or family situations.

The women were both excellent horse trainers and the farm was thriving. They broke horses, did transport and were outearning the male ranches in the area. That put a lot of noses out of order and the men grouped together to run the ranch out of business, refusing the women loans, putting a blacklist on their horses and anything else to ruin them. Eventually the ranch had to be sold for pennies on the dollar and the women who lived there were left penniless.

What could they do? What else except form a gang and start to rob trains, stages and banks? Garrett always made sure they were targeting locations tied to the family that led the events that took their ranch and livelihood. The women flew under the radar as men refused to admit that they had been outsmarted and robbed by women. But eventually the truth came out and the law and the Pinkerton detective agency started to track the women, determined to bring them to justice.

This is a fascinating look at the Old West from another perspective. The women's characters are all different and fully developed. The love between the women who formed a different type of family was real and their friendships allowed them to do things no one would have expected. This is a side of the Old West that hasn't been discussed and Melissa Lenhardt does a great job doing so. This book is recommended for women readers and anyone interested in the Old West.

I really liked the idea of "Heresy" and the actual story was interesting and had some great characters.

What I didn't like and what really dragged down my rating was
1. the frame narrative (which should have been left out altogether in my opinion) because it just felt superfluous and rather pointless and
2. the lack of subtlety in the author's message regarding women's and queer rights. Especially towards the end of the novel, these subjects were just too in your face, instead of being naturally added into the narrative.

Still, I definitely enjoyed reading this novel and would recommend it to readers looking for a different kind of Western.

I'm sorry, I didn't finish this book. I got about halfway through but it just didn't hold my interest.

I received a copy of this book in exchange of an honest review.

I don't really rember much of this book because I skimmed more than 80% of it. I just could get into the writing style. The whole intreview thingy made it so confusing and hard to follow. It is a shame really because my previous experiences with the author proved that she is a phenomenal story teller.
This one just wasn't my jam.

I keep trying to read this book and I keep failing.

I want to love it and, on its surface, it has everything I should love. But I simply can't do it.

For me, it's a combination of the characters (specifically their different voices) and the storytelling style that just don't work for me.

I think that other readers will love it.

But I've tried 4 times now and I'm giving up.

4 stars Thanks to NetGalley and Rehook for allowing me to read and review this book. Published October 2, 2018.


What a great old west novel. Based on true fact this fictional story is told in 3 part. Three women involved in the Parker Gang narrate this book. Foremost is Henrietta Lee, a 92 year old former slave and the only person left alive to tell the story. Also narrating is Grace Trumbull, a former Pinkerton and budding travel writer, along with Margaret Parker, leader, and former Duchess and British widow.

The story takes place in the outbacks of Australia. Parker, known as Garet and Lee known as Hattie were partners in crime who ran a wild horse wrangling operation from their farm. That is when they weren't robbing banks and stage coaches.

There is a whole team of players in this book - nicely outlined in the appendix under Cast of Characters. Usually that will turn me off, knowing there are a multitude of characters to wrestle through, however Lenhardt does a wonderful job of introducing them in a way that you are not confused. Many of the minor characters play a good part in this book.

I will admit to often being confused as to who was narrating the story from time to time. Eventually it became clear, but initially I was not sure. The story is told from all three perspectives. Each character saw things a bit differently and you became privy to their innermost thoughts.

I laughed, I cried and I fell in love with the atmosphere, the characters and the land. Lenhardt did a great job in placing me in the mix of characters. You can feel the heat, you can smell the smells, you can see the beautiful sunsets. A book well worth the read.

I don’t believe I have ever read a western featuring a gang of outlaws that just happened to be women. Heresy is exactly that and the story captured my interest from the very beginning.

Written in journal style and giving the personal accounts of three different women involved, the story follows the years during which a gang of women robbed banks and stagecoaches and never got the credit, due to the fact that no one believed women were capable of such a thing.

Even though the book is about criminals, it’s a fairly clean read, with no gory violence or explicit sex. In fact, at times I detected a bit of slapstick humor in the writing.

Heresy is a very entertaining read, although it seemed to drag a bit near the end. This is the fourth novel that I have read by Melissa Lenhardt and this is my favorite thus far. Readers who like westerns and strong women will enjoy this one!

Many thanks to NetGalley and Redhook Books for allowing me to read an advance copy and give an honest review.

Such a well written and researched book, had a hard time putting it down! Margaret Parker and her female gang are heroines of the West, although not acknowledged by men. This doesn't stop the Pinkertons coming after them, a female agent, who sees the injustices dealt to women in this era.
Highly recommended.

“I didn’t think of men as individuals, but as a toxic hole whose only goal was to protect their power by keeping women down, subservient.”

The last time I read a western would have been The Quick and the Dead. They've never really factored high on my want to read list, and I have zero interest in western romances. But there was a bit of a run on western movies in the 90s and I used to enjoy them a lot. Heresy has all the elements needed to bring a western back onto the big screen. I truly think this novel would make a terrific movie. It's got grit, a clever plot, and a set of memorable characters. And above all, it doesn't romanticise the ‘wild west'. Nothing about Heresy is pretty, but it's a cracking good read.

“That happened then, miners, farmers, businessmen buying wives to do the housework and spread their legs when demanded, squeeze out some children to put to work and make miserable by and by. Pioneering was a hard life for women. They gloss over it in the movies. Make the sodbuster some handsome, good-hearted fella. Make the cowboy honourable. Those types of men were thin on the ground in the West, let me tell you.”

Heresy tells the story of a fictional gang of female outlaws in the ‘wild west’ of America during the 1870s. Each of these women have been betrayed and damaged by men. Each of them want to live out their lives on their own terms. They are as badass as women get, but their loyalty to each other runs deep. They're a family, and no one is going to get in the way of that bond. This novel is unapologetically feminist. It's violent and sometimes disturbing. I loved every bit of it. It's everything you want in a western and then some.

“Taking a man’s life is a sobering proposition, even if it is in the service of saving someone else’s. It’s been a few weeks. I’m over it now.”

The way this novel is structured was fantastic. It's told as though it's a true story, a non-fiction book being written by an historian and we are privy to her primary sources through journals, interview extracts, newspaper articles, essays and even a podcast. It's an inventive way to tell a story, using fictional mixed media like this, and for me, it really worked. There were a couple of times, particularly towards the end when the action was ramped up, that I found it a tad repetitive when we would revisit a scene from a different perspective, but overall, I enjoyed this structure of storytelling a lot.

“The challenge was quickly agreed on: One job before the first snow. No killing or violence. Biggest take wins. Winner gets the ranch. My ranch. Loser leaves the area and finds another place to outlaw. Let me tell you right now: we’re going to win this bet, we’re going to shut Jed Spooner’s mouth, and we’re going to finally get the credit for the jobs we’ve done.”

There's a lot of beauty to be found within the pages of Heresy, within the relationships between the women, the bond between the women and their horses, and the appreciation of the simple things that they each were seeking out of life. Melissa Lenhardt has a real way with words and there is some seriously gorgeous writing throughout this novel, as well a fair share of moments that had me welling up. I like this new angle on westerns, the feminist western if you like, and I'm keen to check out Melissa Lenhardt's backlist. One of the titles is called ‘Sawbones'. How awesome is that title? I love it. I can highly recommend Heresy, particularly to those that don't mind their fiction hard hitting and intelligent, with moralistic themes woven throughout the narrative. It is above all else a truly entertaining read, as wild west as you could get.

"My senses have been highly attuned to the world around me, as if longing to take everything in so the memory of it will stay with me, manifest itself in the afterlife. As if I deserve to be surrounded by things I love. As if I deserve heaven."


Thanks is extended to Redhook via NetGalley for providing me with a copy of Heresy for review.

A great rollicking Western about a gang of outlaw women and their exploits in the 1870s. Led by a freed slave and an Englishwoman with a knack for training horses, this group gets revenge for one of its leaders, runs a ranch, helps out the nearest town, hides and saves abused folks, and lives life to the fullest. People get shot; people die; people get saved; people find love. A wonderful book all around. This will especially appeal to women and girls looking for representation in a historical setting, anyone interested in the "wild west," and readers who love a well-told adventure story with complex and interesting characters.

I can't even remember the last time I read a Western inspired historical fiction story, so I was really excited when I first saw Heresy. And it's not just another historical setting with a Western vibe, because it follows a gange of female outlaws and that's something you don't exactly hear about every day. Unfortunately, somehow Heresy failed to grab me completely. I can't put my finger exactly on the why, but the fact is that it took me a lot longer than expected to reach the final page, and I wasn't enjoying myself as much as I thought I would. This slower pace made the story drag in parts, and this has a lot to do with the format of the story. Instead of a 'simple' storyline or even 'simple' POV switches, we have to learn the story about Margaret Parker through for example diaries, case notes and an interview with one of the gang members sixty years after the fact. In a way very interesting, but for me it didn't really work in the end and it mostly made me feel that the story lacked proper cohesion. There were also facts being repeated and not everything was linear; again not a bad thing on its own, but it ended up bothering me. Don't get me wrong, the story behind Heresy is fascinating and learning about a gang of female outlaws in the 1870s was a true pleasure. I just wasn't completely convinced by the writing style or format, and with the story dragging in parts it wasn't the easiest read. If you like slower paced stories and Western inspired historical fiction stories, you would probably enjoy Heresy though. 

The idea of a historical fiction read with a Western vibe about a gang of female outlaws sounded absolutely fascinating, so I've been looking forward to Heresy. While I still think the idea behind this story is fascinating, somehow I wasn't able to enjoy the execution as much as I thought I would. Between the slower pace, lack of cohesion and parts that dragged, it took me a relatively long time to reach the final page. And while I rooted for Margaret and her gang, I also somehow just wanted to get it over with... And that's never a good feeling. I do think this was mostly me though, so if you don't mind a slower pace and an unusual format, you will probably enjoy this one.

If you love historical fiction that takes place in the wild west, this novel has it all with the bonus of being about women!! This is the little-known story of the Parker Gang, run by Margaret Parker. Colonel Louis Connolly ruthlessly takes away her horse ranch after she turns down his marriage proposal. She turns the tables on him by robbing his banks and holdings with her female partners. Their career is successful because no one believes women could do this. This story keeps you turning pages until the end.

Ms. Lenhardt uses a unique style to tell this story. The main story is told in first person by her good friend, Hattie LaCour. Interspersed throughout Hattie’s story are excerpts from both Margaret’s journal and a reporter’s who has agreed to write the story of the gang. This rare style allows the story to progress with everyone’s prospective.

I genuinely enjoyed this book. The characters are each distinctive in their own right and made for a rollicking good story with the added bonus of being true. It can be read and enjoyed by teen to adult readers!

I was so excited to read this book, I particularly like historical fiction westerns that describe how hard life was back then. The description given for the book is excellent so I won’t go back over what it is about. The writing is great, the descriptions of the locations and the happenings are done so well you can envision the wagons, the ranch, the horses, the gunfights, robberies and the barns.
Since the book was based upon true happenings of the first women bank robbery gang it made it all the more interesting. The story writing style is that each chapter is told by various characters, Hattie, Garet, Grace, Ruby, Stella, etc. I did find it a little confusing sometimes since the timeframe the characters were covering would go back over what had already been told, just re-telling from their perspective.
I particularly enjoyed this story and so glad I read it, the book really covers the struggles woman had in those times and the unfair treatment they had to endure. The Parker gang were feisty, courageous, hard, but also kind hearted women that loved each other and family was most important. This is a good typical western story well worth reading.
I was very pleased to have been given the opportunity to receive this book from Redhook Books through NetGalley. The opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. This one gets 5*****’s.

I received this from netgalley.com in exchange for a review.

Margaret (Garet) Parker and Hattie LaCour were an unlikely pair. Garet was a Duchess from Somerset England and Hattie was a slave. With their small makeshift family, their all female gang pulls off a series of heists across the West.

Great heroic story of truly strong, brave women trying to survive and live in a male dominated world. This western story runs along the lines of Larry McMurtry and Louis L'Amour except this book is based on the live(s) of real people.

4☆

A book about a gang of female outlaws that is everything I hoped it would be- exciting, empowering, diverse, and full of surprises. Most of all it was fun to read. I loved these characters and adored this book.

I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

IT IS AMAZING IN IT'S SELF TO WRITE A BOOK THAT GIVES READERS AN ESCAPE FROM REALITY!! Lenhardt is an author with unbelievable talent in the piercing together of data extracted from different sources into a easy narrative. This is the story of the hardships of women with intelligence trying to win over the persecution of men in the west. Successful rancher and horse trainer Margaret Parker is forced from her home and is left with the intellect to pull off her revenge by becoming an outlaw. Was not sure if I would like this story but it is more than an old west tale; it is about fighting to keep a family not connected by blood together. Many unique characters grace the pages of this book and saddle the reader to gallop to the finish line. "A copy of this book was provided by Redhook Books via Netgalley with no requirements for a review. Comments here are my honest opinion"