Moonshine: A Life in Pursuit of White Liquor (Hungry Mind Find)

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Summary: Really excellent reportage.
Review: I grew up in Tidewater, VA, and I've travelled many of the roads and known the sorts of boys Wilkinson writes about. He really nailed that regional culture, and his ear for dialogue and dialect is finely tuned.

Rating:
Summary: An honest look at a vanishing way of life
Review: I grew up not far from Ahoskie, NC, one of the townsauthor Alec Wilkinson visits in his book. I wasastonished at the accuracy of his portrayal of the people and way of life in rural eastern North Carolina. Wilkinson makes no judgments and draws no conclusions. He simply writes a wonderfully detailed and honest portrait of these people and the politics & life of the moonshiners and revenuers of the swamplands. In the past few years this rural way of life has quickly vanished - pressed from the east by the growth of the tourist industry and overdevelopment of the Outer Banks, and from the west by the rapid growth of the Research Triangle. Moonshine has been replaced by homegrown marijuana. Most small farmers have been bought out by corporate farms and the small towns have become bedroom communities for larger metro areas, with people in Gates and Northampton counties working as far away as Quantico and Williamsburg, VA. I've loaned out my copy of "Moonshine" so many times it is falling apart, but I've never found another book that so accurately describes the world I grew up in. For my transplanted Yankee friends here in the Triangle it has been a great introduction to the rural South. The first Wilkinson book I read was "Midnights", his description of a summer spent as the night patrolman in a small coastal town in Massachusetts. I was struck by his powers of description, and the honest effort of researching his subject by spending many long hours on the job. It is also a fine book. For anyone interested in a slice of life, or just great writing, I'd recommend this book without hesitation. Ken Strayhorn Chapel Hill NC

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Summary: moonshine the life in pursuit of white liquer
Review: this was a preety good book. It is about this guy named Garland Bunting, who has been engaged in caturing and prosacuting men and weomen. To do so he has droven taxi cabs and whatever else you can think of, to get these people to stop selling elligal liquer.he has learned several tips from huntes, they told him that coons can find a illigal monnshine bussnues any day of the week, so from that day on he decided to start raising coon dog's, so that he could catch the scum of the earth (as so he says) who are selling this illigal liquer. This man is 57 years of age and he is of a medium hieght, he has been doing this type of stuff for over 30 years. In north corolina it is illigal to sell liquer on sunday's so the people who are acaholics are always out looking for liquer on sunday's, and that is whern garland is out busting peoepl most of the time. I would recomend this book to any body that is all I have for know thank you for reading my review.