By: Sarah Gailey

Genre: Weird West, near-future, LGBT

The Dust Cover Copy

In Upright Women Wanted, award-winning author Sarah Gailey reinvents the pulp Western with an explicitly antifascist, near-future story of queer identity.

“That girl’s got more wrong notions than a barn owl’s got mean looks.”

Esther is a stowaway. She’s hidden herself away in the Librarian’s book wagon in an attempt to escape the marriage her father has arranged for her—a marriage to the man who was previously engaged to her best friend. Her best friend who she was in love with. Her best friend who was just executed for possession of resistance propaganda.

The future American Southwest is full of bandits, fascists, and queer librarian spies on horseback trying to do the right thing.

The Scene

Worldbuilding

In this stark weird western, we get a look at what it would really be like if the ‘traditional values’ crowd ran things. Every girl belongs in the kitchen, every boy belongs in the War. And the War never ends. The United States has broken up along regional lines, and the West belongs to the Army. To make sure all the children in the country learn this, the Librarians travel about dispensing Approved Materials.

In this world, you do your best to fit in. You don’t fit in, you don’t survive.

But the West is a place that breeds tough creatures who can survive on very little. And a new breed of people has been born who can survive in this harsh environment.

The Crowd

Characterization

Esther is a stow-away. That’s how the story begins. But she is so much more. She’s a girl with all the painful hopes of adolescence tangled together in her soul. She’s a hard worker. A surprisingly tough traveler. A girl with a love that dare not speak its name, as the old euphemism goes. She’s a girl at the end of her rope. A girl so full of the will to live that she’s running away to find a place that will show her how. And Amity, Cye and the Librarians will show her how to do it without giving up on a chance of living her truth. I really appreciated how Gailey has, in the tradition of Hemingway, created a powerful cast with few words. There are wealths of characterization in a few economical gestures and a few sharp sentences. In sharp-edged situations and few words, these characters weave a cat’s cradle of survival, hope, and grit around your heart.

Writing Style

Stark, clean and sharp as desert life, this story uses the conventions of a Western to reinvent the way you look at LGBT characters, the meaning of freedom, and the value of the stories you tell yourself. It’s a powerful approach, and it’s a touch on the brutal side at time. But it’s a book that we need sometimes: a book that tells you that yes, you can survive this. Yes, you will get up in the morning. And you can keep going. Whatever comes.

The Moves

Plot

Swiftly and energetically plotted, this book has a twist like a stabbing knife in it, and it completely surprised me. That isn’t easy to do these days! For all its harshness, it does end on a powerful note: hope for tomorrow.

Overall Rating

A fine and powerful tale of rough lives, Western skies, and standing on principal. Toss in a dash of intrigue, and you’ve got a book you won’t put down until you’ve turned the last page.
Pick it up. You’ll be glad you did.