I do my best to focus. If not, I'd be all over the place. Literally. In time and geography. That's the curse of being fascinated by all aspects of brewing everywhere. Sticking to the UK helps. Without being 100% effective.
After assembling a mass of material while putting a talk together, and seeing how little there was about beer in the VLB book on the DDR brewing industry, I'm extremely tempted to write a second book about East Germany. But who the hell is my expected audience? It's a bit of a niche topic.
Sometimes, you know, you stumble into writing a book. I do, at least. Quite often. It's an example of my ability to get side-tracked. Because I had lots of lovely fresh brewing records from Youngs, I published quite a few recipes. Then I had the interview with former Youngs brewer John Hatch. It just made sense to collect it into a book format where I wouldn't lose or forget about it. Currently 32,000 words, the manuscript.
My principal project is "Free!". UK beer 1880-1914. Another of the chapters from my Meisterwerk documenting UK beer from 1700 to 1973. I've been doing it in a random order. With these published so far:
1914-1920 Armistice!
1918-1939 Peace!
1939-1947 Blitzkrieg!
1946-1969 Austerity!
1970-1979 Keg!
Being totally honest here, I have a thing for late Victorian an Edwardian beer. And pubs. They still exist. The beer doesn't. And I wish it did. Publishing a shitload of recipes from the period will hopefully give me the chance to try a few beers from the Golden Age of UK brewing. As I've chosen to call it, based purely on my own prejudices.
411 recipes so far. Quite a few more to go.
Which of these three books would you like me to finish first? (DDR! vol. 2, Youngs!, Free!)
Let me know. Then I'll decide if you're right. Or not.
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