The Hangman’s daughter vs the Outlaw Gang!

Winning Maura's Heart (Hangman’s Daughters #1) by Linda Broday   

⭐️⭐️⭐️

I’m not big on Western romances but thought I’d give this a whirl. It has it all, a feisty heroine and her sister, a tall gunman who appears to be a Deputy US Marshal, a vicious baddie and his gang, a drunken Uncle, three wonderful French nuns and a host of delightful children. The action takes place in and near to San Antonio, Texas in 1867. How they all come together is quite a satisfying yarn.

Maura and Emma Taggart are the daughter of the Hangman, rendering them outcasts as far as the local society’s concerned. They are ostracized and worse by the “kindly christian citizens” of the town. Yellow Fever had plagued San Antonio with many dead. The girls had tended the dead and dying with kindness and determination with no thought of payment. These are two big hearted women. They'd looked after the growing number of orphans.  After the worst was over, when there services were no longer needed, they were run out by those same “good” citizens.

But they had a plan. They resettled themselves and the children at a mission some miles away. A mission already inhabited by three French nuns.

When Maura went out hunting she found a man almost dead. That’s when the story really got started!

Maura and the lawman Calhoun developed a relationship, albeit with some hesitation. I must admit it was a little too “shucks ma’am” for my taste but it worked.

Naturally nothing is simple. The outlaws come back and things go from bad to worse. Still  heroes need a good ending, and this definitely had that.

A Severn Press ARC via NetGalley.                                              

Many thanks to the author and publisher.