Jetta Carleton, author of Clair de Lune, on tour March 2012

About Clair de Lune

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial (March 6, 2012)

An unexpected treasure: A long-lost novel of innocence threatened, by the author of the beloved classic The Moonflower Vine

The time: 1941, at the cusp of America’s entry into World War II. The place: southwest Missouri, on the edge of the Ozark Mountains. A young single woman named Allen Liles has taken a job as a junior college teacher in a small town, although she dreams of living in New York City, of dancing at recitals, of absorbing the bohemian delights of the Village. Then she encounters two young men: George, a lanky, carefree spirit, and Toby, a dark-haired, searching soul with a wary look in his eyes. Soon the three strike up an after-school friendship, bantering and debating over letters, ethics, and philosophy—innocently at first, but soon in giddy flirtation—until Allen and one of the young men push things too far, and the quiet happiness she has struggled so hard to discover is thrown into jeopardy.

About Jetta Carleton

Jetta Carleton was born in 1913 in Holden, Missouri, and earned a master’s degree at the University of Missouri. She worked as a schoolteacher, a radio copywriter in Kansas City, and a television advertising copywriter in New York City. She and her husband settled in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where they ran a small publishing house, The Lightning Tree. She died in 1999. The Moonflower Vine was, until now, her only published novel.