The Moonshiner's Daughter

Starred review from November 25, 2019
Everhart’s rousing fourth novel (after The Giving Kind) follows 16-year-old Jessie Sasser’s struggle to reckon with her family’s moonshining in 1960s North Carolina. Jessie blames her father, Easton, for her mother’s death in a distilling accident, which she vividly remembers witnessing when she was four, but Easton refuses to discuss it. Jessie’s sense of inferiority at school and around town pits her against Easton and her younger brother, Merritt, both of whom are proud of their outlaw identity. Her isolation and anger drive her into bulimia, while her sole friendship, with a classmate named Aubrey, turns sour after Aubrey takes a shine to Willie Murry, whose unscrupulous family runs a rival distillery. After Jessie confides to Aubrey about her plan to destroy her family’s operation, Aubrey warns Willie that his own family will receive the blame. Aubrey’s betrayal unleashes a chain of events that pushes Jessie into trying her hand at the stills. Everhart movingly explores Jessie’s struggle with her eating disorder, viscerally describing her twin desires for nourishment and purging in relation to a deep need to define herself: “It happened when there came this need to fill what was barren, satisfy a void that belonged not to regular hunger, but to something else.” Everhart’s story of self-discovery, rife with colorful characters and a satisfying twist, will thrill readers.

Starred review from December 15, 2019
The Brushy Mountains of North Carolina are home to many generations of moonshiners, but Jessie Sasser doesn't want to have anything to do with the family business. She associates moonshining with the untimely death of her mother, which left Jessie responsible for the family home, her father, and a brother who is more than happy to carry on the legacy tied to their family name. Her father refuses to speak about her mother at all, which pushes Jessie towards self-destructive behavior. She longs for the truth about her mother's death so badly that she feeds her pain with food, which she later purges. Her eating disorder is dubbed the "monster" by the school nurse, Mrs. Brewer. As the monster grows, Jessie makes a series of bad decisions that leave her and her brother relying on the kindness of Mrs. Brewer, and as Jessie learns about her mother's reputation as a great moonshiner, she begins to find her place among her family. This riveting novel set in the 1960s will have readers, especially those who enjoy Kaye Gibbons and Anna Jean Mayhew, captivated from the first page.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)