Book Review: 101 [World] Whiskies to Try Before You Die

[dan_the_tax_man]

In December 2012 - at Christmas, to be precise - my younger brother gave me a copy of Ian Buxton's ( @101Whiskies on Twitter) 101 World Whiskies to Try Before You Die, which I quite dutifully thumbed through, made some notes about which of the whiskies listed I'd tried, which I currently had in inventory in the basement waiting to be opened, and what might be available at the LCBO...many of them are not, which may necessitate travel at some point.  I noted, however, that this was the second book in "series" (soon to be followed by a third book, "Legendary Whiskies", if I understand correctly), and I made up my mind to try and track down a copy of the original 101 Whiskies to Try Before You Die; it wasn't that difficult, actually, as it was readily available on Amazon (and apparently in Chapters, too), but I don't have the "Revised and Updated" version.  Note, these books should not be confused with the similarly titled 1001 Whiskies You Must Try Before You Die, by Dominic Roskrow (which I do not own, yet...).

As this is ostensibly a book review, I guess I have to tell you what I think of the books...so, here goes:

Pros:

• the books themselves are quite durable and very portable (with removable sleeves);
• Mr. Buxton doesn't pretend that he is providing a list of "the best whiskies", simply whiskies that he thinks people should try as part of their exploration of whisk(e)y, whether they happen to be "good", "bad", or somewhere in-between;
• not limited to Scotch Single Malts (the second World Whiskies volume moreso than the first);
• includes whiskies from taste profiles that Mr. Buxton doesn't personally prefer (he doesn't hide behind his biases);
• limits recommendations to whiskies that are, in general, readily available (he can't accomodate for all markets, so I can't fault him if certain whiskies are not available at the LCBO);
• doesn't provide numerical scores, only his impressions of the whiskies (for several reasons, which he explains in the Introduction of both books); and
• provides space for your own notes at the bottom of each page;
• the books can be quite humourous (at least I found it humourous, but, like whisky, whether you enjoy something or not is completely subjective), with Mr. Buxton taking aim at a number of issues within the industry (such as the SWA vs. Glen Breton).

Cons:

• some of the references, comments, and humourous asides are very specific to the U.K. and may therefore be lost on North American readers (but given that the book was initially written with a U.K. / European focus, this is to be expected);
• being Canadian, it would have been nice to see a few more Canadian whiskies mentioned (although, in fairness, some of the best Canadian whisky has been released subsequent to the publication of both books...);
• a little heavy on the Diageo-owned malts in the first book (again, in fairness, when Diageo owns nearly half the distilleries in Scotland, this is hard to avoid, especailly when trying to recommend readily available whiskies...); and
• I found the way the whiskies were arranged and organized a little confusing at first - alphabetically by whisky in the first book, regardless of country of origin, except for those distilleries that have 'The' in their title, and then alphabetically by country of origin, then whisky in the second book.  This took some getting used to especially with the change in format between the two books.

Would I recommend these books?  Absolutely.  Mr. Buxton has crafted some amusing anecdotes, provided some genuinely interesting information about the whiskies listed and the distilleries that produce them (but not too much, leaving the reader to do their own leg-work), and has left it to the reader / drinker to come to their own conclusions about the whiskies that he "recommends" (and I've quotation marks here because his recommendations aren't "go out and try this because it is good", they are "go out and try this because it is whisky and you'll learn something from it".  The descriptions provided are not gospel; rather, the book provides gentle guidance, allowing the reader to "choose their own adventure", but without having to shell out huge sums of money for highly limited expressions.  If there was a "gateway" book / series for whisky, then I've fallen down the rabbit hole...and while I'm not limiting my purchasing / sampling to the whiskies listed in either book, it is interesting to come home after an evening out and check whether what I consumed during the evening is in fact one of the whiskies "recommended".