"After two books titled A Natural History of Wine and A Natural History of Beer, a companion volume on spirits might appear to have been almost inevitable. Once again, we look at our subject through the lens of natural history, positioning it within the diverse contexts of evolution, ecology, history, primatology, molecular biology, physiology, neurobiology, chemistry, and even astrophysics, in the hope that these connections will help enhance your appreciation of the liquid that is hopefully reposing in a glass within arms reach as you read. But we have departed a bit here from our earlier format. Spirits are in certain respects trickier for the analyst than beers or wines because, particularly with barrel aging, spirits derived from vastly different sources can converge significantly over time, just as spirits within the same general category can develop vastly different characteristics. So, because of the sheer variety of distilled spirits on the market, both in terms of major categories and of regional variations on the distilling theme, we have called on several knowledgeable colleagues to contribute or collaborate on some of the chapters (9, 11-12, 14-19 and 22) that deal individually with the "Big Six" spirits that have traditionally dominated the international market by sales volume, as well as with various of the more regional specialty spirits, some of them (like soju and baijiu) also big sellers, others more obscure. Accordingly, all the chapters (9-22) that deal with specific spirits or drink types have been identified by author. By asking all contributors to adhere to the same basic outline, we hope we have been able to maintain the books balance while at the same time admitting a range of different voices to the discussion"--.