Hops, Water, Yeast books.

Yes they are more in depth. A whole book on water that is well researched vs. the usual thin chapter of dubious information? Who knew.

 

I didn't get a whole lot out of Yeast. It's too scientific. It did help give some good ideas for yeast washing and for top cropping though.

 

I have all three, like everyone has said they are scuba deep. I put on an air tank and dove in!

Great resources and a contibutor to our craft for sure.

 

I liked them all. hops is the most readable but doesn't have a tremendous amount of data that hasn't been covered in other good brewing texts.
yeast is very good, but it reads like it was written by a micro biologist. go figure. tons of worthwhile information.
water is technical, though if you want to understand water brewing chemistry there ain't no way around it. it is helpful to have all the data in one source.

well worth the money for your library and each one will probably become a first reference when I am curious or have a specific question.

 

I have Palmer's new Water book (it's the poolside reading book I brought with me on vacation) - I haven't really started but a quick thumbing through it looks like it could me chemical engineering ****. I do want to see what his thoughts are on water composition for each style and how that has changed since his "How to Brew" - I've used that as the reference in how to build my water for all of my beers and I've heard that some of his ppm recommendations have changed.