Hang the Moon

From Jeannette Walls, the bestselling author of The Glass Castle, a riveting new novel about an indomitable young woman in Prohibition-era Virginia

Most folk thought Sallie Kincaid was a nobody who’d amount to nothing. Sallie had other plans.

Sallie Kincaid is the daughter of the biggest man in a small town, the charismatic Duke Kincaid. Born at the turn of the twentieth century into a life of comfort and privilege, Sallie remembers little about her mother, who died in a violent argument with the Duke. By the time she is just eight years old, the Duke has remarried and had a son, Eddie. While Sallie is the Duke’s daughter, sharp-witted and resourceful, Eddie is his mother’s son, timid and cerebral. When Sallie tries to teach young Eddie to be more like their father, her daredevil coaching leads to an accident, and Sallie is cast out.

Nine years later, she returns, determined to reclaim her place in the family. That’s a lot more complicated than Sallie expected, and she enters a world of conflict and lawlessness. Sallie confronts the secrets and scandals that hide in the shadows of the Big House, navigates the factions in the family and town, and finally comes into her own as a bold, sometimes reckless bootlegger.

‘Hang the Moon is Jeannette Walls’s masterwork. Epic in scope, the novel is a thrill ride through Prohibition and change in the American South … The prose is so elegant and so close to the bone you feel Sallie’s heartbeat. Glorious.’
Adriana Trigiani, author of The Good Left Undone

‘Does what all good books should: it affirms our faith in the human spirit.’
Dani Shapiro on The Glass Castle

‘Like J.D. Salinger or Hemingway before her, Jeannette Walls has the talent of knowing exactly how to let a story tell itself.’
Sunday Independent on The Glass Castle