The Wettest County in the World
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| Author | Matt Bondurant |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Historical novel, Crime novel |
| Publisher | Scribner |
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Publication date
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October 14, 2008 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 320 pp (hardback edition) |
| ISBN | (hardback edition) |
The Wettest County in the World is a 2008 historical novel by Matt Bondurant, an American writer who features his grandfather Jack and grand-uncles Forrest and Howard as the main characters in the novel.
The book tells of the trio during the Depression and Prohibition in rural Virginia, who made a living bootlegging moonshine. The novel is told from both the perspectives of the three Bondurant brothers, mainly focusing on the youngest, Jack, and of the writer Sherwood Anderson, who described Franklin County in that period as the "wettest county in the world" while working there as a journalist during Prohibition. The film Lawless (2012), directed by John Hillcoat, is based on the book with a screenplay by Nick Cave.
The novel, inspired by the author's paternal grandfather Jack and two great-uncles, Forrest and Howard, focuses on the historical events of the Great Franklin County Moonshine Conspiracy, a series of events and a trial related to the illegal activities of the moonshiners in Franklin County. Sherwood Anderson was there working as a journalist at the time. To research the historical period, Bondurant listened to family stories and used archival records, news clippings and court transcripts. Locals began to think of the three brothers as "indestructible" because all of them survived.
In an essay, Bondurant said that he had illegal moonshine from Franklin County, despite having been raised in Alexandria, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C.. As a teenager, he first drank moonshine, and he knows his relatives in Franklin County drank moonshine at family events. Bondurant said he had difficulty getting information from people in Franklin when researching the novel. The illegal liquor-making in the county is a topic not often broached in public. He says that "you could spend years [in Franklin County] and never see [moonshine drinking], even as it is all around you."
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