D.H. Schleicher's Reviews > The Broken And The Foolish

The Broken and the Foolish is a wildly entertaining feminist spin on the classic Western Outlaw saga.

Kjeldsen's novel was a pleasant surprise as it had a little bit of everything: action, romance, grit (well, a lot of grit), deep introspection, and great colorful characters, especially the lead Mary, a young woman forced into prostitution who murders her way out of it and into a new kind of twisted freedom where she's torn between her desire to live a peaceful life and her desire to seek revenge against the man responsible for the horrors she endured.

A few of the episodes borderline on cartoonish...or perhaps are too pulpy (some of the villainy is depicted with glee), but the overall tone is one of gritty entertainment. If you want a rollicking, feminist Western yarn...you'd be remiss if you didn't boldly look The Broken and the Foolish in the eye.