Best books on distilling history and the law

If this site got you curious, these books go deeper: the tax fights, the moonshiners, Prohibition and the law that still shapes American whiskey.

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How we chose: history, law and science only. We leave out books that teach how to distill spirits, since doing that at home is a federal felony for most Americans.^[1] The notes below draw on the books' published reviews and publisher descriptions, linked in the sources.

Prohibition and alcohol law

Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition

Daniel Okrent, 2010. The standard popular history of how a country voted itself dry, what happened next and how it undid the experiment in 1933. Start here if you read only one book on Prohibition.^[2]

The War on Alcohol: Prohibition and the Rise of the American State

Lisa McGirr, 2015. A historian argues that enforcing Prohibition built much of the modern federal enforcement machinery, and that it fell hardest on immigrant, Black and poor communities. Scholarly but readable.^[3]

Smashing the Liquor Machine: A Global History of Prohibition

Mark Lawrence Schrad, 2021. Prohibition as a worldwide movement, not just an American one. Kirkus wrote that readers "won't look at temperance the same way" afterwards.^[4]

The Poisoner's Handbook

Deborah Blum, 2010. New York City's chief medical examiner and his toxicologist investigate poisonings in the Jazz Age, including bootleg liquor laced with methyl (wood) alcohol. It explains why methanol is a real danger in illicit drink.^[5]

Bourbon Justice: How Whiskey Law Shaped America

Brian F. Haara, 2018. A Louisville lawyer tells the history of bourbon through its lawsuits and the laws they produced. A good pick for readers interested in the legal side.^[6]

Whiskey Rebellion

The Whiskey Rebellion

William Hogeland, 2006. A narrative history of the 1794 uprising against the first federal tax on whiskey, with Washington, Hamilton and the frontier rebels at its center. Our history page gives the short version.^[7]

Moonshine and NASCAR

Moonshine: A Cultural History of America's Infamous Liquor

Jaime Joyce, 2014. A slim, well-reviewed history that goes beyond the Southern-moonshiner stereotype, from colonial times to the present, through fact, folklore and fiction.^[8]

Moonshine: A Global History

Kevin R. Kosar, 2017. A short book in Reaktion's Edible series covering moonshine's politics, pop culture, the dangers of bad liquor and today's legal "moonshine" brands.^[9]

Driving with the Devil: Southern Moonshine, Detroit Wheels, and the Birth of NASCAR

Neal Thompson, 2006. How moonshine runners and their souped-up cars turned into stock-car racing.^[10]

Bourbon and American whiskey

Bourbon: The Rise, Fall, and Rebirth of an American Whiskey

Fred Minnick, 2016. A history of bourbon from its earliest days to today, praised for how it handles bourbon's complicated regulatory history.^[11]

Bourbon Empire: The Past and Future of America's Whiskey

Reid Mitenbuler, 2015. The story of bourbon and the business and politics around it, from the frontier to the modern boom.^[12]

Love & Whiskey

Fawn Weaver, 2024. The true story of Jack Daniel, his master distiller Nearest Green, and the rise of the Uncle Nearest brand.^[13]

The science

Proof: The Science of Booze

Adam Rogers, 2014. A science writer's tour of yeast, fermentation, distilling, aging, taste and what alcohol does to the body. Science, not a how-to; Kirkus gave it a starred review.^[14]

Shopping for someone?

See gifts for whiskey and history lovers for these books plus glassware and homebrewing kits.