This book is a bit of a rollercoaster. The amount of family drama Sally has to endure is a lot but she is still a strong and resourceful young woman. This book takes place during a time where women are taught to rely on men but Sally is a lot more strong willed than most. I love that she's able to find other women to connect with when most authors would surround her with men to show how she's "not like other women". This book also does a good job of showing that many situations lie in the gray and that there are both good and bad men.

Jeanette Walls creates a strong female protagonist in her historical fiction novel, “Hang the Moon”. Sallie, the daughter of Duke Kincaid, is summoned home upon the death of her stepmother. For a decade, Sallie has lived with her Aunt Faye in challenging conditions in Virginia’s hills. Sallie does not know what her role is with her estranged family, but quickly she is given the role as caregiver to her younger brother, Eddie. On one fateful day, Sallie is thrust into the role of being the head of the family and the town. Sallie learns Duke’s business and shameful secrets. She also learns that she is a woman who is not happy to fall into the typical roles of wife and mother. She wants power and enjoys the excitement of being a “rum runner” during Prohibition. But there is cost to her power.

I enjoyed that Sallie was breaking the mold, but I grew tired of death after death after death. Some characters’ deaths were too convenient for moving the plot forward but didn’t seem believable.

Overall, I would recommend this book to juniors or seniors, especially as a companion text to “The Great Gatsby”.

Thank you to Jeanette Walls, Scribner, NetGaley for the ARC.

2.5 stars. I was so disappointed. I really liked this author's first three books but this one bounced around to so many different story lines that I just couldn't connect with any of the characters. Bottom. Line: Sally Kincaid thinks her daddy hung the moon. Sadly, he just bedded every female who wandered through the house.

I've loved Jeannette Walls's writing since reading The Glass Castle years ago. I was delighted to get a chance to read an ARC of Hang the Moon. I read a good amount of historical fiction, but the Prohibition era isn't one I get to read much of, so this was a real gem.

Many thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for sharing this book with me. All thoughts are my own.

Thank you to Scribner, Net Galley and the author, Jeanette Walls for allowing me to read this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Jeanette Walls know how to weave together a story. If you have read any of her previous books, you know that. This book has many surprises and twists that I could not have predicted.

Hang the Moon is told from the POV of the headstrong Sallie Kincaid. Sallie is the daughter of Duke Kincaid from his second marriage. Duke is a powerful man who runs their small town. He owns the Emporium where the town shops and where he is often giving out advice to the locals. When Duke marries for a third time, he finally has a son, Eddie. Duke's third wife is very protective of Eddie and when an accident involving Sallie and Eddie leaves Eddie banged up, Jane ships Sallie off to live with her aunt. She is told it will just be a month. Nine years later, after the death of Jane, Sallie returns to the big house. There she is met with an adoring father who no longer knows her and her 13 year old brother. She wants to get to know Eddie better and her father puts her in charge of her schooling.

Set during the time of Prohibition, much of the town is making illegal whiskey. The Bond brothers, one of the biggest distributors have long running family tension with the Kincaids. They believe that Duke stole land from their grandfather, land where the big house now sits. Is the land truly theirs? Is the land cursed? Through a series of tragedies, Sally keeps picking up the pieces to not only keep her family going, but also the town she loves.

Special thanks to NetGalley for the advanced reader copy of this book. This may be unpopular opinion, but I found the book lapped depth and and I fail to see the point of the book at all.

This is historical fiction set primarily in the 1920s during Prohibition; it's a coming of age story about Sallie Kincaid. Overall, a well-crafted tale, we learn about a lot of family dysfunction and secrets and the lasting effects on the community.

Begins with an intriguing and complex family dynamic, but devolves into assorted episodes, none of which are particularly interesting or seem to add up to a dynamic whole.

I first read Jeannette Walls' memoir The Glass Castle in high school. It was a book that I so often would recommend or gift to others because it is such a moving piece

I was so excited to get an ARC of Hang the Moon. I LOVED THIS BOOK. I love a book set during Prohibition and I love Walls' writing so there was little she had to do to win me over. But Sallie was the perfect main character. I loved reading about her return to Virginia and all that ensues. Excited to have another Walls book to add to my must read recommendation list!

Sallie Kincaid believed her father, Duke, was bigger than life, and she hung on his every word and action. Then after a childish accident, the 8 year-old is banished to her Aunt Faye's hard scrabble cabin. She will be 15 years old before she finally gets a call to come home, for her step mother's funeral. According to her father's orders she's to teach her younger half brother, to make him a real Kincaid. In other words, to make him tough as she is. Sallie tells herself over and over that she has grown up to be beholding to no one, but soon as she takes the Duke's place, she is beholding to everyone. And she must make decisions about what is legal and what is right. Jeanette Walls is a masterful storyteller, and she's created a Southern mountain family that is secretive and flawed, powerful, yet caring within its own creeds. In a story that rushes from one crisis to another, Walls has captured a version of prohibition rarely presented. I received a copy of HANG THE MOON from Netgalley and all opinions expressed are mine.

Oh my goodness! I haven’t read a novel this quickly in a very long time. I loved every single word, sentence, paragraph, and chapter of this wonderful story! It seems as though every time I turned a page, something unexpected happened. The book contains so many twists and turns it’s like riding a roller coaster . . . on speed! I finished reading its 368 pages in less than 24 hours, and I do believe that is a record for me. I cannot praise this book enough nor recommend it more! Jeannette Walls has outdone herself.

Many years ago I also devoured Jeanette’s fantastic, bizarre, and very true memoir, The Glass Castle, that reads more like an improbable novel than a true-life story. The memoir stayed on The New York Times’ bestseller list for over eight years. I knew then that Jeanette Walls was a fantasti c writer destined to write wonderful, worthy books, but I hadn’t read anything more of hers until now. I regret not yet having read her two previously published and acclaimed novels, The Silver Star and Half Broke Horses, the latter of which was named one of the ten best books of 2009 by the editors of The New York Times Book Review. I intend to remedy my mistake soon.

I sincerely thank Ms. Walls and her editor, Scribner, and NetGalley for giving me an advanced reader’s copy of Hang the Moon’s manuscript. I apologize for not reading it and writing this review before it was published in March, 2023, but I simply have been in over my head with various obligations. I’m sorry I didn’t read it sooner because I enjoyed it so much and cannot wait to read more of Ms. Wall’s writings! Thank you to Scribner and NetGalley for bringing this fabulous new book to my attention.

Hang the Moon by Jeannette Walls is a great novel with a strong and fierce leading lady. Set during the prohibition era Sallie Kincaid is what all women strive to be. A leader, resilient, and her own person. I absolutely loved this book. I loved the story, the characters and the journey that Walls takes us on. I highly recommend this book!

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! No spoilers. Beyond amazing I enjoyed this book so very much. The characters and storyline were fantastic. The ending I did not see coming Could not put down nor did I want to. Truly Amazing and appreciated the whole story. This is going to be a must read for many many readers. Maybe even a book club pick. Our library purchased and our patrons have been checking out and and enjoying the book. I see it is a popular book club choice as well we hope to have more oppurtinies to support authors like them

This book was quite possibly the worst book I’ve ever read. None of it made sense to me. The writing was so bad that I almost stopped after each chapter. Truly, it was just awful.

Jeannette Walls, fiction novel "Hang the Moon" was a puzzling mixture of familial drama and shoot 'em up action packed fighting. Set in prohibition time this book follows Sallie Kincaid who is of the Virginia Kincaid family, this family basically runs this small town in Va. The story was often all over the place with a long list of characters who I tried to remember, but then realized they weren't integral to the storyline. I honestly wasn't exactly certain what the heck the plot of the story even was.. Unfortunately, in my humble opinion it was not Ms. Walls best work. I loved her non fiction books and am thrilled that she has moved into fiction, I just didn't love this book. It was just too confusing to be entertaining. Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an advance copy for my unbiased opinion on this novel.

Sallie Kincaid grew up privileged as the daughter of the legendary Duke Kincaid. After losing her mother at a young age to mysterious circumstances, Duke remarries and has a son. When Sallie inadvertently causes and accident that injures her brother, she is sent to live with an aunt.

Several years later, Sallie is allowed to return home to find things very different and secrets everywhere. She tries to prove her worth to her father and learns how he rules their home and town. As time goes on, Sallie makes a name for herself as a bootlegger, not the normal path for a woman at the turn of the 20th century.

Sallie has a complicated relationship with her father which leads her to make decisions that influence her life. She is an interesting character.

I absolutely loved The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls and it remains one of my favorite books. While this book was not as good for me as that one, I still enjoyed it. This historical fiction novel was well researched and well written. The main character is a driven woman with desire to stand up for what is right. Recommend!

"Hang the Moon" is a historical fiction novel focusing on Sallie Kincaid, daughter of the richest man, in what is admittedly a rather poor county.
Set just before, and during, Prohibition, it follows Sallie tumultuous upbringing after being evicted from her familial home to go live with her aunt, at her step mother's insistence, and her subsequent return after her step mother's death.

Hang the Moon was inspired by historical events from Tudor England all the way through 1920's America, and just like those times, it was a wild and interesting ride. Sallie was smart, headstrong and interesting, determined to live life on her own terms, and have the family that she always longed for... but not necessarily in the way everyone else did. Just like she lived her life.

Excellent, fun read.

Jeannette Walls is normally a prolific writer but this plot was over the top with so many deaths and such terrible actions of men. I was into the rhythm of the story but after the fourth or fifth tragic death (I honestly lost count), it was really hard to take this seriously. Way too much going on and completely implausible. I enjoyed her other books much more.

Times are tough during the prohibition and depression era in Southwestern Virginia, but Duke Kinkaid keeps the economy going through his dealings at the Emporium and the government he controls keeps the peace. He's sort of a benevolent despot. He also doesn't like being single so he runs through 4 wives, and this is the story of Sallie, the daughter of Duke and his second wife. I was reluctant to read this because I found the author's GLASS CASTLE was so devasting, but Sallie is a hero. She has all of Duke's best qualities, and none of the negatives. She's tough, a problem solver, and she holds her family close, both the one she was born into and the one she put together from pieces that didn't fit anywhere else. Highly recommend!!
Thank you to Scribner, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, and NetGalley, for the digital arc.