Lewis Jones

Enjoy gin but don’t read books? Or read them only while drinking gin? This is the book for you

A review of Gin Glorious Gin, by Olivia Williams. A diverting, if not remotely scholarly, history that charts the social ascent of this spirit, from dram shop to the Queen Mother’s handbag

‘Some find their death by swords and bullets; and some by fluids down the gullet’. Thomas Rowlandson’s illustration of ‘The English Dance of Death’ by William Combe, 1815 — a satire on the evils of drinking gin [Getty Images/Alamy/iStock/Bridgeman]
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  • Gin Glorious Gin

    Olivia Williams

    Headline, pp. 317

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