Westward Bound debunks the myth of Canada's peaceful West and the masculine conceptions of law and violence upon which it rests by shifting the focus from Mounties and whisky traders to criminal cases involving women between 1886 and 1940. Erickson's analysis of these cases shows that, rather than a desire to protect, official responses to the most intimate or violent acts betrayed an impulse to maintain boundaries between men and women, Native people and newcomers, and capital and labor. Victims and accused could only hope to harness entrenched ideas about masculinity, femininity, race, and class in their favor. This fascinating exploration of hegemony and resistance in key contact zones draws prairie Canada into larger debates about law, colonialism, and nation building.