by Jeannette Walls ★★☆☆☆
The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls's memoir, was a New York Times bestseller for more than eight years. I hadn't seen anything from Walls since that book, one I remember enjoying, and so I was interested to discover what she'd do with fiction. As I saw the cover of Hang the Moon, I noticed she'd also written another novel, Half Broke Horses. "Hmm, I wonder why I never heard about that..." I thought to myself. I think I now know the answer why: Walls wrote a great memoir, but her talents don't extend when she's crafting something she hasn't lived herself.
The book opens with a seven-year-old Sallie Kincaid interacting with her father, "The Duke", a man who effectively controls everything that happens in backwater Claiborne County, Virginia around the turn of the 20th century. Even at an early age, Sallie is showing a brashness and the fearlessness of youth. But when it gets her in trouble, she is sent to live with her aunt.
Fast-forward 12 years, and The Duke summons Sallie and asks her to return to "The Big House". The country is still reeling from World War I, Prohibition has recently been passed, and things are at an inflection point. However, The Duke still runs things in Claiborne County, and while the rules may have changed, much has stayed the same. What follows is Sallie's journey as she comes of age and works to establish her identity as an adult and a woman in a world where men are very much in control. It's transparent what Walls wanted to do: create a strong, trend-bucking woman from 100 years ago that did things her way and set an example for other women who were unable to do the same.
Unfortunately, it's so poorly done. Hang the Moon is a mess. It's disjointed, the characters don't connect with the reader, and while I commend Walls for creating an interesting main character in Sallie Kincaid and a decent character arc as Sallie grows into womanhood and herself, there were so many ways I this could have been better. I couldn't help but think about Great Circle, a novel set around the same time, with a strong female main character who fought for her place in a man's world. That was one of my favorite novels of 2021. By comparison, Hang the Moon misses the mark badly, and when examining the thoughtful plotting and character growth in that novel, the failures of Hang the Moon are brought into stark relief.
In reading the book's acknowledgments, I think I got a glimpse into what may have happened. Walls says "Some characters and scenes in this story were inspired by actual people and events", and then goes on to cite several scenes from the book that were "culled from newspaper reports about similar incidents." I suspect, as Walls was researching Prohibition, she kept coming across captivating events and thought to herself, "Oh, I need to include that!" But what happened was the reader is left with a series of events that don't seem to fully fit together and is left wondering why some were ever included.
I was intrigued by the potential of Hang the Moon, but by the time I was three quarters of the way through, I just wanted it to be over. Even with 50 pages left, I considered just stopping, but that was close enough that I figured I'd see if Walls could wrap it up in a meaningful way. To her credit, Walls did tie together some loose ends in those final 50 pages, but not enough to even get this to an average 3-star rating. This is, obviously, one to skip.