Run for the Hills

Kevin Wilson’s 2025 domestic fiction novel, Run for the Hills, follows 32-year-old Madeline “Mad” Hill, whose quiet life running a successful organic farm in Tennessee is upended by the arrival of Reuben “Rube” Hill. Rube reveals he is her older half-brother, abandoned by the same father who disappeared from Mad’s life decades earlier. This discovery launches the pair on a cross-country road trip to find their serially reinventing father and the other siblings he left behind, forcing them to piece together their family’s fractured past. Originally published in 2025 by Ecco, the novel explores themes of The Tension Between Inherited Legacy and Self-Creation, Narrative as a Tool for Reclaiming a Fractured Past, and Redefining Reconciliation Through Connection.

Run for the Hills continues Kevin Wilson’s career-long exploration of unconventional family dynamics, blending his signature deadpan humor with heartfelt emotion. Wilson is the author of several acclaimed novels, including The Family Fang, which was adapted into a 2015 film starring Nicole Kidman and Jason Bateman, and Nothing to See Here, a New York Times bestseller and a “Read with Jenna” Today Show Book Club selection. His work, which often features eccentric characters navigating bizarre circumstances, consistently examines themes of found family, parental legacy, and the strange ways people connect. His fiction has earned him a Shirley Jackson Award and an Alex Award, cementing his reputation for crafting quirky and imaginative stories about the families people inherit and the ones they build for themselves.

This guide is based on the 2025 Ecco first edition.

Content Warning: The source material and this guide feature depictions of cursing, emotional abuse, illness, mental illness, racism, gender discrimination, and death.

Plot Summary

In 1982, a young Madeline “Mad” Hill, helps her father, Charles Hill, harvest and process sorghum on their family farm in Coalfield, Tennessee. While they wait for the sorghum to cook into syrup, they share a quiet moment on the porch. Her father expresses a hope that she will one day make syrup with her own children but quickly retracts the statement, telling her not to feel pressured by the future. Mad feels at peace and eagerly awaits the taste of the syrup they made together.

The narrative jumps to the present day, 2007. Mad is 32 and runs the successful Running Knob Hollow Farm with her mother, Rachel Daggett. Her father disappeared 23 years ago. One Saturday, a nervous man named Reuben “Rube” Hill arrives at their farm stand in a PT Cruiser. He reveals that he is Mad’s older half-brother and that they share the same father, Charles Hill, whom Mad knew as “Chuck.” Rube explains that their father also abandoned him and his mother in Boston over 30 years ago. He then discloses that their father created other families and that they have more siblings. Stunned, Mad invites Rube into her home.

Inside, Mad and Rube compare their vastly different memories of their father. Rube’s father, “Charles,” was a Boston-based mystery novelist, while Mad’s father, “Chuck,” was an organic farmer from Maine who disliked fiction. They find common ground in their father’s love for nicknames, home movies, and sporting events.

When Mad’s mother, Rachel, arrives, she is less surprised than Mad expects, revealing that she knew Chuck had started another family after leaving them. She reveals that shortly after Chuck left, he called from a pay phone to say he was “starting over.” He called her occasionally on her birthday but never asked to speak to Mad. Rube explains that his journey began after his mother, Winona, died of cancer. Shortly after her death, his father called their old apartment, and when Rube answered, his father hung up. This prompted Rube to hire a private investigator, who found two more siblings, a college student in Oklahoma and a young boy in Utah, and tracked their father to California. Rube asks Mad to join him on a cross-country trip to find their family, and with her mother’s encouragement, she agrees. Mad and Rube begin their trip west. Interludes of 8mm home movies show glimpses of their separate childhoods, one with Rube and his mother in their Boston apartment in 1968, and another of Mad and her mother on the farm in 1978.

When the siblings reach Memphis, they stop for barbecue and discuss how their father’s abandonment has affected their adult relationships. They then head to Oklahoma to find their sister, Pepper “Pep” Hill, a star basketball player for the University of Oklahoma. Upon arriving on campus, Mad and Rube call Pep to tell her about their mutual paternity. She is initially hostile but eventually believes that they are telling the truth. She is about to leave for the NCAA tournament in Austin but agrees to a brief meeting. At the university’s basketball arena, Mad and Rube meet Pep, a tall, athletic young woman who reveals that her version of their father was a high school basketball coach. Later, at the tournament game in Austin, they meet Pep’s mother, Cathy Permalee, who refers to their dad as “Chip” and confirms that he lied about his past and occasionally called on her birthday after he left her, a fact she has kept from Pep.

Early in the game, Oklahoma’s other star player experiences a serious injury. Pep plays poorly in the first half but leads a phenomenal comeback in the second. Oklahoma ultimately loses when Pep’s potential game-winning shot is released just after the final buzzer. Devastated by the abrupt end of her college career, Pep calls her siblings and asks to join their journey. They pick her up as she flees from her team. An interlude shows a 1994 home video of a young Pep playing basketball, filmed by her father.

The three siblings drive toward Salt Lake City to find their younger brother, Theron “Tom” Goudy, whose mother, Trista Goudy, is a local news anchor. With this family, their father went by “Carl.” While driving through New Mexico at night, Rube totals the PT Cruiser. Although Rube insists the engine malfunctioned, his siblings suspect he fell asleep at the wheel. No one is seriously injured, but the accident leads to a tense argument that culminates in a moment of bonding. Rube confesses a fleeting fantasy of killing their father, an idea he abandoned after finding his siblings. They get a new rental car, a Chevrolet HHR, and continue their journey. Another home video interlude from 1999 shows a young Tom pretending to be a weatherman for his parents.

In Salt Lake City, the siblings meet Tom, a precocious 11-year-old filmmaker. Tom reveals that their father was also a filmmaker and left behind a box of 8mm films containing home movies of all their childhoods, which he had carried with him between families. The siblings are moved but hesitate over whether or not to let Tom join their trip. When his mother, Trista, arrives, she privately confesses to Mad that Tom is not their father’s biological son; “Carl” stepped in as a father figure after Trista became pregnant by a married colleague. Trista eventually ended the relationship, after which Carl disappeared. Believing it best for Tom to get closure, Trista signs a consent form allowing him to travel with his siblings.

The four siblings drive to California. They arrive at their father’s last known address at a Woodside mansion but are told by the occupant that he lives on a large property called Dardanelle Ranch. On the ranch, they find a modern cabin and, while exploring, encounter their father, Charles Hill. He is now 70 years old and carrying a toddler named Rooster in a backpack. Rooster is their fifth sibling—his full name is Reuben—and he is the son of their father and a wealthy heiress named Lucky, who owns the ranch with her two sisters. Their father works as the groundskeeper and is Rooster’s primary caretaker.

The siblings confront their father for abandoning them. He struggles to explain his actions, describing a lifelong pattern of feeling trapped and reinventing himself to escape his past. They agree to stay the night so each sibling can speak with him privately. During his conversation with Rube, their father reveals that he is in the early stages of a fatal, degenerative neurological disease. Rube shares this news with Mad and Pep. In turn, Mad reveals the secret of Tom’s paternity. They all agree Tom is still their brother. Rube decides to stay on the ranch indefinitely to spend time with their father and help care for him.

The next morning, Tom arranges to stay on the ranch with Rube and their father for a while longer, with plans to return for the summer. Mad and Pep say their emotional goodbyes. Mad drives Pep back to her dorm in Oklahoma, and the two sisters promise to remain in each other’s lives. Mad completes the final leg of the journey alone, arriving back at the farm in Tennessee. Seeing her mother, she feels anchored by her connection to both her old and new family, finally at home.