Mark Pendergrast

From its invention as a cocaine-laced patent medicine in the Gilded Age to its globe-drenching ubiquity as the ultimate symbol of consumer capitalism, Coca-Cola's dramatic history unfolds as the ultimate business saga.

The definitive history of the world's most popular drug. Uncommon Grounds tells the story of coffee from its discovery on a hill in ancient Abyssinia to the advent of Starbucks. Mark Pendergrast reviews the dramatic changes in coffee culture over the past decade, from the disastrous "Coffee Crisis" that caused global prices to plummet to the rise of the Fair Trade movement and the "third-wave" of quality-obsessed coffee connoisseurs. As the scope...