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Top 5 books about cocktails and spirits, chosen by Camper English

The cocktail writer and blogger Camper English selects five books all about booze, ingredients and the joys of mixology

Author and blogger Camper English chooses the best books about cocktails, spirits and mixology.

1. The Oxford Companion to Spirits & Cocktails by David Wondrich and Noah Rothbaum

Start on any page of this new, definitive encyclopedia of cocktail history and let it take you on a journey from entry to entry. It’s a boozy Wikipedia you can hold in your hands.

2. The Drunken Botanist: The Plants That Create the World’s Great Drinks by Amy Stewart

The ground-to-glass view of spirits and cocktails from one of America’s great nature writers; a most magical drink book rooted in the earth. 

3. Liquid Intelligence: The Art and Science of the Perfect Cocktail by Dave Arnold 

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The hows and whys of advanced cocktail techniques from centrifuge cocktail clarification to nitro-muddling; ideal for the advanced home or professional mixologist who wants to bring some razzle-dazzle to their daiquiris. 

The Perfect Tonic by Camper English
The Perfect Tonic by Camper English is out now (William Collins, £16.99)

4. Proof: The Science of Booze by Adam Rogers

A nerdy, narrative investigation into fermentation, distillation, and how humans experience the flavour and impact of alcohol, from a Wired writer and editor.   

5. Fizz: How Soda Shook Up the World by Tristan Donovan

The history of carbonation and fizzy sodas and their use in and as medicine is every bit as fascinating as that of the liquor it is often mixed with. In Fizz, Donovan takes us from the era of supposedly healthy Schweppes soda water to the saccharin cancer scares and Coca-Cola of today. 

You can buy The Perfect Tonic from The Big Issue shop on Bookshop.org, which helps to support The Big Issue and independent bookshops.

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