The Meaning of Beer

A humorous and informative history of one of our most popular drinks - beer.

What's the most consumed alcoholic beverage on earth? Beer, of course. It's something Jonny Garrett knows a thing or two about, having spent most of his adult life working as a beer writer (disappointing many a family member along the way). In The Meaning of Beer he shows how beer has been fundamental to the way human civilisation has evolved.

Since its invention around 13,000 years ago our love of beer has shaped everything from religious ceremonies and politics to TV advertising and technology - the people who built the pyramids were paid in ale, the first ever fridge was built for beer not food, bacteria was discovered while investigating sour beer, beer halls hosted Hitler's rise to power, brewery advertising still funds most professional sports, and brewer's yeast may yet be the answer to climate change.

The Meaning of Beer tells the human stories of these historic moments and inventions, taking the reader to some of the best-known beer destinations in the world - Munich's Oktoberfest, Denmark's Carlsberg Brewery and its famous laboratories, St Louis and the home of Budweiser - as well as those lesser known, from an epic 5,000 year-old brewery in Egypt, to the brewery making beer slushies in a church in Stockholm.