Book Review: The Modern Herbal Dispensatory: A Medicine-Making Guide

BRMI Staff

A Book Review

There is a particular kind of book that earns permanent residency on a kitchen shelf, spine cracked, pages stained with tincture and tea, consulted so often it stops feeling like a reference and starts feeling like a collaborator. Thomas Easley and Steven Horne's The Modern Herbal Dispensatory: A Medicine-Making Guide (North Atlantic Books, 2016) is exactly that kind of book. It is practical, principled, and written with the rare combination of scientific literacy and genuine reverence for the plant world — a combination that proves harder to find than one might expect in the herbal publishing landscape.

What The Modern Herbal Dispensatory Is and Who It's For

At its core, The Modern Herbal Dispensatory is a comprehensive manual for making herbal medicines at home and in clinical practice. But to call it merely a "how-to" guide would be to underestimate its ambitions. Easley and Horne are both seasoned herbalists and educators — Easley runs the Eclectic School of Herbal Medicine and Horne is the founder of Tree of Light Institute — and their combined decades of teaching experience are evident on every page. They write not just to tell you what to do, but to help you understand why, building the kind of foundational knowledge that allows a reader to eventually improvise, troubleshoot, and develop their own formulations with confidence.

The audience is genuinely broad. Complete beginners will find the early chapters accessible and patient. Intermediate practitioners will discover the book fills in conceptual gaps they didn't even know they had. And even experienced clinical herbalists will find the standardization discussions, the solvent chemistry breakdowns, and the detailed extraction ratio tables worth referencing regularly.

Where the Book Truly Shines

The Chemistry Without the Intimidation

One of the book's most significant achievements is its accessible treatment of herbal chemistry. Easley and Horne explain how different solvents — water, alcohol, glycerin, vinegar, oil — interact with different classes of plant constituents, and why this matters enormously for the potency and character of the final preparation. This is the information that separates someone who can follow a recipe from someone who genuinely understands what they're making. Most popular herbalism books gloss over this entirely. Here it is laid out with clarity and real-world relevance, without requiring any background in organic chemistry.

Preparation Methods, Comprehensively Covered

The range of preparations covered is impressive. Tinctures and fluid extracts receive thorough treatment, including both the folk method and the more precise weight-to-volume method. Beyond tinctures, the book covers teas and decoctions, infused oils, salves and ointments, poultices, syrups, oxymels, glycerites, capsules, lozenges, liniments, and more. Each preparation type gets clear instructions, equipment lists, troubleshooting notes, and shelf-life guidance. The inclusion of oxymels — those old-fashioned preparations combining honey and vinegar — feels particularly welcome at a time when these elegant, accessible preparations are enjoying a well-deserved revival.

Formulation Philosophy

Perhaps the most intellectually satisfying section of the book is its treatment of herbal formulation — the art and science of combining herbs into effective, balanced preparations. Drawing on both Western and Eclectic herbal traditions, Easley and Horne walk the reader through how to build a formula around a therapeutic goal rather than simply throwing together everything that's "good for" a given condition. They are also admirably measured in their approach to evidence, acknowledging what is well-supported by research, what remains traditionally used but unstudied, and where the evidence is genuinely mixed. This epistemic honesty is refreshing.

Standardization and Quality Control

A chapter that distinguishes this book from many of its peers covers quality control and how to evaluate the herbs you're working with. In an era when the herbal supplement industry is rife with adulteration and inconsistency, the authors give you the conceptual tools to understand what quality actually means and why it varies — going well beyond a simple "buy from reputable suppliers."

Production and Design

North Atlantic Books has produced a handsome, well-organized volume with helpful tables, charts, and bolded terms that make it easy to use as an ongoing reference. The lack of lavish full-color photography — present in so many herbal books, often at the expense of content — feels like exactly the right editorial decision. This is a working book, and it looks and feels like one.

Final Verdict

The Modern Herbal Dispensatory fills a genuine gap in the herbal literature. There are excellent books on plant identification, on the history of herbalism, and on the therapeutic uses of individual herbs — but a book this thorough and technically grounded on the actual craft of making herbal medicine is rare. Easley and Horne have written something that will serve beginners for years as they develop their skills and remain useful to experienced practitioners as a trusted reference.

If you are serious about herbal medicine — whether as a personal practice, a household skill, or a clinical vocation — this book belongs within arm's reach of wherever you make your medicines. That is the highest compliment one can pay to a book of this kind.

Highly recommended for: home herbalists, clinical practitioners, students of herbal medicine, and anyone interested in understanding the "why" behind herbal preparation — not just the "how."

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This article is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for the direct care of a qualified health practitioner who oversees and provides unique and individualized care. The information provided here is to broaden our different perspectives and should not be construed as medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.