The Poisoner's Handbook is really good. Read the book, watch the documentary. Learn about murder, mischance, and moonshine. This chapter might have been more detailed if I hadn't loaned my copy of the book to a friend before we ended up in separate quarantines. Who'd'a thunk there would come a time when I couldn't just get anything from the library?
Begin Recording
Moonshine
Recording by Scribe Ellison
At last, the General has returned! Later than we expected. Doc Jenna asks. "What have you been up to?"
"Getting plastered in Goodneighbor. The party lasted longer than the case, or at least it feels that way."
Later on I get the full story.
"A batch of bad gin hit The Third Rail and left three people blind. Mayor Hancock wanted the source found yesterday so he called in Valentine who called me to be another gun and Piper to report on events. If there's an idiot out there who doesn't know what not to put in a still everyone needs to know about it right away.
"So Nick asked some questions and tracked the gin to the person who made it and the person he bought the moonshine from who'd transported it from a brewing outfit just starting up in an old cannery. They'd converted some big vats to distill alcohol and loaded them with razorgrain—and sawdust to stretch it. So what came out was poison. What our Tom makes for Doc Jenna to sterilize her surgical instruments. Poor idiots didn't even know what they were making.
"We handcuffed them and hauled them back to Goodneighbor and Mayor Hancock gave them the most blistering lecture I've ever heard and informed them that they would now be working in Goodneighbor and supporting the three drifters who'd gone blind. Which is indentured servitude which isn't great, but I was just thankful Hancock hadn't gone all eye-for-an-eye. Messengers went out to warn every place that might have bought the bad moonshine.
"Whitechapel Charlie was thankful we'd saved the rest of his customers and kept the drinks coming and pretty soon we were sharing a large table with the mayor and Nick's friend Irma and Daisy and Magnolia who Piper invited over and Emogene Cabot who just seemed to be there. Piper managed to write her article, drink, and flirt with Magnolia at the same time. And I discovered that a one-with-dinner occasional drinker shouldn't have six or seven in one night even if a nice cockney robot keeps offering her different drinks to try. Not sure what happened after that, but I woke up in the mayor's guest room determined never to party that hard again."