Classic Bourbon, Tennessee & Rye Whiskey by Jim Murray. London: Prion Books Limited, 1998. Contents, Index, Illustrated, Pp.272.
This is a book for those who love tasting notes. Jim Murray is a master wordsmith and his tasting notes reflect this talent. He has taken the distillers and listed them in alphabetical order, gives some brief information about their brands and their history and does tasting notes for those brands in most expressions of the brand. He places color illustrations of many of the labels with his notes so the reader can be sure exactly what brand he is writing about. It truely is a book for those readers who like tasting notes.
He starts the book with a couple of chapters of historical background of American whiskey distilling. The history is brief but for the most part accurate. He is an Englishman trying to understand American history so the reader does have to forgive some statements such as Kentucky "having gained its independence in 1792, having begun the battle in the year of Boone's memoirs". The reader has to wonder what battle he is talking about.
The book looks good. It is well designed and colorfully illustrated. It has an index that makes finding specifics points very easy. It would have been nice if he had included a bibliography, but then again, this book is about tasting notes and they don't need other sources. A book like this has value in a bourbon library if for no other reason, it looks good.
Mike Veach