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Title: Wg: Wines of California by Stephen Brook ISBN: 1-84000-393-6 Publisher: Mitchell Beazley Pub. Date: 03 February, 2002 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (1 review)
Rating: 5
Summary: Excellent source on California Wine.
Comment: The Wines of California, Stephen Brook, Faber and Faber, London, 1999, ISBN 0-571-19030-8. Paperback; 685 pages; $20.
Stephen Brook has been a freelance writer for many years specializing in wine and travel books. He won the André Simon Award in 1987 for Liquid Gold: Dessert Wines of the World, and has written several other excellent travel and wine books. He has been learning about and drinking California wines since the late 1970s, and finds that California wines appeal to him strongly for their generosity: "California wine regions routinely succeed in offering rich, full-bodied, fleshy, opulent wines that make an immediate sensory appeal." This is a generous book that beautifully expresses the "instantaneous pleasure" he finds in California wine.
Brook briefly summarizes the history of wine in California, relying gracefully on the works of Charles Sullivan. He has a short, but excellent, summary of the "rules of California wine", asserting that California as an independent country would be the world's fourth largest producer after Italy, France and Spain. (A telling comment: "By and large, California wineries are not keen to dupe the consumer, although the overall laxity of the regulations often makes it easy for an element of deception to creep in.") Brook devotes about a quarter of the book to the wine regions, a quarter to grapes and types of wines, and the balance to a "Gazetteer" of various producers throughout the state. Throughout he relies on personal relationships with hundreds of grape growers, wine makers, writers and wine lovers.
Brook emphasizes that: "There were no secrets, no mysteries, about wine. My questions, whether about viticulture or winemaking techniques, were readily answered." In a favorable review of the book published in "Decanter" recently, Gerald Asher emphasizes that "this willingness to share information has made it possible for Brook to track changes that amount to a U-turn in all things vinous in the state. When talking to growers elsewhere, I am often amazed to hear them make references to a California that no longer exists - they cannot imagine a place where change can be so rapid and so fundamental."
Brook is quite skeptical about the AVA system, but his summaries are clear and historically accurate. Similarly with his descriptions of the various types of wine; I found his section devoted to Zinfandel particularly enlightening. But the heart of the book is a series of short, elegant essays on hundreds of different wineries; there are no tasting notes to speak of, but he captures the styles of wines made by many of these wineries in quite a remarkable way. And he captures the history and the character of the wineries with conciseness and clarity.
For example, I have just finished reading Robert Mondavi's autobiography, Harvest of Joy, admittedly a book that could have benefited from tighter editing. Brook's four pages captured the essence of Mondavi's story with style and warmth.
It would be fun to quote dozens of these essays; here's part of one favorite just to give you the flavor of the whole: "Newton's vineyards are not open to the public, which is a great shame since these are arguably the most beautiful in all of California. Peter Newton's wife Su Hua is Chinese, and the terraced vineyards are reminiscent of Chinese landscape paintings, the whole effect enhanced with red-lacquer gateways, wooden pagodas, and other Chinese ornaments. ... Peter Newton told me that Su Hua is now the winemaker, even though she also pursues a separate career in San Francisco. It's perfectly conceivable that this immensely dynamic and talented woman does indeed make the wines. She has been a model, a scientist, designed much of the vineyard and winery buildings, and has formidable expertise as a wine marketer. There is a mysterious personage at Newton called Luc Morlet; he is the director of oenology, but I have never met him and don't know what he does. The team is completed by the consulting services of Michel Rolland, who only advises on his special subject: Merlot."
I can only agree with Gerald Asher that only a person who finds great pleasure in California wine could have "devoted himself to a study of this magnitude. I give it a 'thumbs up'." Highly recommended.
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Title: A Companion to California Wine: An Encyclopedia of Wine and Winemaking from the Mission Period to the Present by Charles L. Sullivan, Hugh Johnson ISBN: 0520213513 Publisher: University of California Press Pub. Date: October, 1998 List Price(USD): $39.95 |
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Title: Wine Spectator's California Wine by James Laube ISBN: 1881659569 Publisher: Running Press Pub. Date: October, 1999 List Price(USD): $39.95 |
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Title: Wg: Wines of Burgundy by Serena Sutcliffe ISBN: 1840007095 Publisher: Mitchell Beazley Pub. Date: 01 May, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Wg: Wines of Spain by Jan Read ISBN: 1840007109 Publisher: Mitchell Beazley Pub. Date: 07 March, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Wg: Wines of Bordeaux by David Peppercorn ISBN: 1840005505 Publisher: Mitchell Beazley Pub. Date: 09 May, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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