As part of my already year-and-a-half-long program to bring active reading back into my life, in February I encountered two interesting books (out of three).

"War, Wine, and Taxes" - a brief description of centuries-old disputes between Great Britain and France; despite their image as the planet's main free traders, the British were not averse to hitting their competitors with a club of tariffs and excise taxes.
It was precisely because of customs barriers on French wines that brewing, gin, and whiskey production flourished in England.
Having protected the market from French imports, the state thoroughly fleeced domestic producers, but that came later (this is a spoiler of what may await our domestic producers).

The Portuguese and Spaniards were responsible for wine supplies to Great Britain, which explains the active historical and financial presence of the British in Portuguese winemaking, and that is why in 2022 some wine and port producers quickly left the Russian market (some have quietly returned recently).

The book contains many numbers and tables; if world economics and history are not your areas of interest, you might find it boring—an interest in wine alone is not enough here.

"Why Nations Fail" - there is nothing about wine here; I suspect this book is the world record holder for the use of the words "inclusive" and "extractive." At times it is a bit naive; I still don't understand why the authors completely reject the geographical factor as one of the possible components of countries' prosperity, but overall it is an interesting historical-economic book. The authors apparently even won the Nobel Prize for research on this topic.

This Telegram channel was clearly not intended for book reviews, but hit like if you found it interesting anyway 🤫