Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

  • The Sun and the Moon

  • Hoaxers, Showmen, and Lunar Man-Bats in 19th-Century New York
  • By: Matthew Goodman
  • Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
  • Length: 12 hrs and 22 mins
  • 4.6 out of 5 stars (5 ratings)
Offer ends May 1st, 2024 11:59PM GMT. Terms and conditions apply.
£7.99/month after 3 months. Renews automatically.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
The Sun and the Moon cover art

The Sun and the Moon

By: Matthew Goodman
Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
Get this deal Try for £0.00

Pay £99p/month. After 3 months pay £7.99/month. Renews automatically. See terms for eligibility.

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically.

Buy Now for £21.99

Buy Now for £21.99

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Listeners also enjoyed...

Rebel Souls cover art
Between Man and Beast cover art
Charlie Chan cover art
Chester B. Himes cover art
Gunpowder and Geometry cover art
What Is Man? cover art
American Eden cover art
Old Thunder cover art
Arthur Conan Doyle cover art
Henry David Thoreau cover art
Wolf: The Lives of Jack London cover art
Nabokov in America cover art
Brave Companions cover art
The Prodigy cover art
The Road to Monticello cover art
Eyes on the Street cover art

Summary

The Sun and the Moon tells the delightful and surprisingly true story of how a series of articles in the Sun newspaper in 1835 convinced the citizens of New York that the moon was inhabited. Purporting to reveal discoveries of a famous British astronomer, the series described such moon life as unicorns, beavers that walked upright, and four-foot-tall flying man-bats. It quickly became the most widely circulated newspaper story of the era.

Told in richly novelistic detail, The Sun and the Moon brings the raucous world of 1830s New York City vividly to life, including such larger-than-life personages as Richard Adams Locke, who authored the moon series but who never intended it to be a hoax; fledgling showman P. T. Barnum, who had just brought his own hoax to town; and a young Edgar Allan Poe, convinced that the series was a plagiarism of his own work.

©2008 Matthew Goodman (P)2008 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Goodman consistently entertains with his tale of press manipulation, hucksterism and the seemingly bottomless capacity for people to believe the most outrageous things. Absolutely charming." (Kirkus Reviews)
"The Sun and the Moon tells an intriguing story and reveals some fascinating facts about nineteenth-century New York." (Booklist)
"Mr. Goodman has managed not only to give us a ripping good newspaper yarn but also to illuminate life in the nation's largest city in the early part of the 19th century. He also provides something of a treatise on the birth of modern mass-market newspapering." (Wall Street Journal)

More from the same

What listeners say about The Sun and the Moon

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    3
  • 4 Stars
    2
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1
  • 4 Stars
    2
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    1
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    4
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.