Nose: Dark brown sugar - we're leaning into that molasses here, charred oak, and some high-quality vanilla. Rice bran - if you've ever smelled brown rice while it's cooking, you know what this note is. Biscuits and roasted nuts. Clove, anise. Leather, tobacco. Plums. Dusty books. Citrus oil and pine. The proof here makes itself known, though it isn't nearly as in-your-face as I was expecting. Ripe blueberries and strawberries. Palate: Big, deep, charred oak, brown sugar, and vanilla. Solid barrel bite, but in a very appealing way. Dark chocolate, leather, and dark roast coffee. Tobacco. Take a second to acclimate to the proof and you'll find tons of banana, apricot, peach, and blueberries up against the baking spices that the rye brings to the party. Plenty of clove, cinnamon, nutmeg, star anise, and thyme. Wintergreen, too. Deeply toasted grains. Lemon oil. Solid tannin presence in texture and taste. This is firing on all cylinders, with the upper, middle, and lower palate all perfectly balanced. Mouthfeel is medium-heavy. Finish: As you'd expect, we start with a big rush of ethanol. As that subsides, brown sugar, charred oak, and vanilla are revealed. Barrel bitter, mint, and lemon oil work their way to the front. We then shift to clove, nutmeg, dark chocolate, and cavendish tobacco (think particularly gloopy OTC stuff like Captain Black). Long finish - this stuff hangs out for a while. Other notes: I have yet to try a single high proof thing out of the Beam distillery that I haven't been genuinely impressed with, and this is no exception. The blending on display is excellent, with the brown rice bourbon bringing some excellent character that makes me wish it would become "a thing". Personally, I'm a sucker for big, chewy, high proof bottlings and this fits nicely into that category. An excellent addition to the Little Book lineup, and one that I will likely buy a few more times before it disappears. In fact, as much as I enjoyed Chapter 3, I find myself preferring this by a good margin. This is the kind of thing that I would regularly buy and have stocked if it weren't a limited release. Guess I'll need to sock a bottle or two away for the long term.