Product Description

The Prohibition Hangover examines the modern American temperament toward drink amid the $189-billion- dollar-a-year industry that defines itself by the production, distribution, marketing, and consumption of alcoholic beverages. Based on primary research, including hundreds of interviews, Garrett Peck provides a panoramic assessment of alcohol in American culture and history.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #352576 in Books
• Published on: 2009-08-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 336 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780813545929
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

Review
"Garrett Peck provides a clear, concise, and stimulating overview about alcohol use and alcohol policy in the United States since Repeal in 1933. The book deftly combines careful research, excellent story-telling, and strong opinions about strong drink."
William Rorabaugh, University of Washington and author of The Alcoholic Republic

Spirits are all the rage today. Two-thirds of Americans drink, whether they enjoy higher priced call brands or more moderately priced favorites. From fine dining and piano bars to baseball games and backyard barbeques, drinks are part of every social occasion.

In The Prohibition Hangover, Garrett Peck explores the often-contradictory social history of alcohol in America, from the end of Prohibition in 1933 to the twenty-first century. For Peck, Repeal left American society wondering whether alcohol was a consumer product or a controlled substance, an accepted staple of social culture or a danger to society. Today the legal drinking age, binge drinking, the neoprohibitionist movement led by Mothers Against Drunk Driving, the 2005 Supreme Court decision in Granholm v. Heald that rejected discriminatory curbs on wine sales, the health benefits of red wine, advertising, and other issues remain highly contested.

Based on primary research, including hundreds of interviews with those on all sides—clergy, bar and restaurant owners, public health advocates, citizen crusaders, industry representatives, and more—as well as secondary sources, The Prohibition Hangover provides a panoramic assessment of alcohol in American culture. Traveling through the California wine country, the beer barrel backroads of New England and Pennsylvania, and the blue hills of Kentucky’s bourbon trail, Peck places the concerns surrounding alcohol use within the broader context of American history, religious traditions, and governance.

Society is constantly evolving, and so are our drinking habits. Cutting through the froth and discarding the maraschino cherries, The Prohibition Hangover examines the modern American temperament toward drink amid the $189-billion-dollar-a-year industry that defines itself by the production, distribution, marketing, and consumption of alcoholic beverages.

From the Inside Flap
"The Prohibition Hangover is an excellent book in every way: it is well researched, thoughtful, and entertaining to read. From discussions of policies since Prohibition to Americans' tastes for drinks throughout the decades, this book will be of interest to anyone interested in alcohol."
Edward Stringham, Trinity College and author of No Booze? You May Lose: Why Drinkers Earn More Money Than Nondrinkers

About the Author
Garrett Peck is a freelance journalist who has written mostly within the alcohol industry trade circles. Based in Washington, D.C., he also regularly conducts tours of historic sites that hold a significant place in the temperance movement in and around the district.

Customer Reviews

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Alcohol
The author takes on the subject of alcohol, and covers it from every angle, delving into such diverse topics as the history of alcohol (and its potential future); changing social attitudes about consumption; the medical evidence regarding drinking; politics, and the motivation of alcohol taxation; and the impact of religion on alcohol use. Overarching all this is an in-depth discussion of the Temperance movement, and its lasting impact on America's attitude toward alcohol. There's something for everyone here.

The author brings it all together in a surprisingly accessible and interesting way for the average reader. He clearly has his own opinions on this controversial subject, and he's not afraid to share them, keeping the read lively.

The book reveals that almost 2/3 of American adults consume alcoholic beverages. Given that we, as Americans, spend so much time and money on alcohol, it only makes sense to understand more about it. A thorough, well-written book about a fascinating topic. Recommended!

The Prohibition Hangover won't give you one
Garrett Peck's enjoyable and entertaining account takes the reader through the changing mores surrounding the consumption of alcohol in America. The book's broad account takes the reader on tours of whiskey country in Kentucky, California's wine regions, and the history of American beer brewing. The title refers to the continuing effects of Prohibition, in particular the patchwork of federal, state and local laws that still limit the production, sale and consumption of alcohol. Peck also shows that we're drinking less in quantity, but enjoying higher quality, as seen in the decline of the big national beer brands. Peck is probably at his best describing the furious lobbying efforts and the perennial marketing battles as the distillers, brewers and vintners jostle for market share. If you're looking for the reasons behind what and why we drink--and how, when, and where we do it-- you'll probably find the answers here.

Well-written and informative
Garrett Peck has written a highly informative and entertaining account of the liquor industry in the United States. The author provides background on the temperance movement of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and shows how, even today, that movement affects our liquor laws and attitudes. He also provides interesting information about the production of different types of liquor and insights into trends in this important industry. Whether you drink a lot or not at all (or are somewhere in between), you will find "The Prohibition Hangover" enjoyable.