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

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 

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. 

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. 

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