Fanfiction Review: A Drop of Moonshine

Last week, we looked at Past Sins, one of the most famous fanfics in FiM's massive fandom. Today, I'm looking at another one of Pen Stroke's works; in fact, this was the story that directly followed Past Sins in publication. Will it be better? Worse? Somewhere in the middle? We'll find out when we finish looking at A Drop of Moonshine.

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SYNOPSIS:

After Celestia has a rather stressful day running the country, Luna tries to help by searching for her hidden liquor bottle. To her dismay, however, alcohol was actually banned in Equestria shortly after Luna's banishment, on account of Celestia's rampant alcoholism after such a traumatic event. But Luna can synthesize alcohol through moonlight, and surely a single drink can't hurt...

REVIEW:

I'm going to get this right out of the way: A Drop of Moonshine is my absolute favorite Pen Stroke fic. It's crazy, funny, a little sad at parts, and just a lot of fun to read through.

The central premise of the story is that Celestia was so distraught over banishing her sister that she turned to drink, becoming a rampaging, out-of-control alcoholic who ruined lives and screwed up formal events in her stupor. Her advisers then banned alcohol entirely, since as long as a single drop existed, Celestia would find it. So we have Celestia as a recovering drug addict, more or less, who gets tempted by her unwitting sister into trying that old habit of hers. Way to go, Luna.

The rest of the story is about the two drunk princesses acting like idiots, going to Ponyville, and sucking up Twilight into their escapades. And in one of the other nice touches, alcohol has been outlawed for so long that Twilight has no idea what's gotten into the princesses, what alcohol even is, and how to deal with two drunk demigods. As the story continues, it becomes about Twilight trying to restrain a totally sloshed Celestia as she attempts to eat all of Applejack's apples and chew on...well, you have to read the rest to get that.

There are really only two real weaknesses I can find with the story. The first is that Luna more or less vanishes from the picture halfway through, returns again briefly towards the end, and is passed out entirely during the last scene. While the Celestia/Twilight stuff was strong, it would have been nice to see more of drunk Luna in the process. (This might be explained by it being a pre-Luna Eclipsed story, and thus before Luna had much of an established character.) And second, the story just...stops. The ending scene is funny as all get out, but the narrative just feels like it comes to a screeching halt.

There was a sequel, A Mug of Hard Cider, but I'll probably review that one by itself down the line.

FINAL THOUGHTS:

If you like stories about Celestia and Luna getting drunk, then this is a good one to look at. It's nothing deftly serious or moving, but it's still just a lot of good fun. It's still my favorite work by Pen Stroke, and it's kind of sad that it's doomed to be forgotten in the shadow of Past Sins.