Will I love Girly Drinks?

If there were a single riposte to the cliché that men inherently know more about booze than women, then Girly Drinks by Mallory O’Meara would be it.

Mallory is neither a drinks journalist nor a professional bartender, but she is an unstoppable force on a mission to set the record straight about women and booze. Going deep into women’s history while simultaneously reflecting on her own experiences with alcohol, she takes us on a whistle-stop tour across the ages and around the world.

Her style is witty, assertive, and just the right side of combative. I couldn’t help but fist… show more.

Mallory O’Meara’s book, Girly Drinks: A World History of Women and Alcohol, has become my new bible.

I spent years working to advance women around the world before taking on a new challenge – starting a new craft distillery in Rwanda! You might be wondering how women's rights and alcohol intersect, but O’Meara sums it up best in her book: “If you want to know how a society treats its women, all you have to do is look into the bottom of a glass.”

For an amusing and eye-opening look at the history of women alcohol producers and drinkers… show more.

I became aware of this book shortly before it was published because Mallory and I were on a radio show together in 2021 to discuss alcohol in the age of COVID. She was bold, radical, funny, and obviously super-smart. So is her book.

I also love that she saw that women had largely been written out of alcohol histories, then went ahead and decided to fix that. Throughout the years, we’ve heard bits and pieces about women being early brewers, distillers, tavern-keepers, and bartenders but, until now, nobody ever dealt with it comprehensively. It was about time.