The Compleat Meadmaker by Ken Schramm is an excellent book on making mead. Of the dozen books I have read on producing cider, wine, beer, and mead, this is one of the two best. The basic ‘Changing Honey into Wine’ chapter is a short and clear explanation you can use to produce your first batch of mead, and the rest of the book is detailed and accurate enough that The Compleat Meadmaker is worth keeping around as a reference. Schramm includes lots of useful information about honey and other ingredients, as well as a good history of mead. Unlike some books that are little more than, ‘do this, it works,’ Schramm explains everything well enough that you will have a good idea why it is done, and can decide if you want to skip a step. One contrast with other zymurgy books is that Schramm does a good job of providing clear and accurate definitions of terms, and places the definitions where they are needed.

The Compleat Meadmaker is well written, and is both a good introduction and a good resource to keep around. I used this book as a reference for making my first batches of mead and cyser, and I intend to refer to it in the future.

BibTeX reference:

@book{schramm2003compleat,
    Author = {Ken Schramm},
    Publisher = {Brewers Publications},
    Title = {The Compleat Meadmaker: Home production of honey wine from
            your first batch to award-winning fruit and herb variations},
    Year = {2003}
}