A gentle education in the fine art of wine and a treat through and through for the bibulous biblio/Francophile.
Wine entrepreneur Lynch (Inspiring Thirst: Vintage Selections from the Kermit Lynch Wine Brochure, 2004) updates his 1988 original, winner of the Veuve Clicquot Wine Book of the Year Award.
Toward the end of the author’s revisitation of winy haunts, he ventures a telling note on the difference between his native California and his adopted France: In California, there is a movement afoot to emblazon wine bottles with an image of “a pregnant woman and a giant wineglass with a slash through it.” Lynch recalls his pregnant wife’s French doctor offering the Gallic prescription: “Of course you do not want to drink five liters a day, but a glass of wine with lunch and dinner will be good for you.” Getting to that point requires traveling down some bumpy roads to wonderful vineyards deftly described, with all the notes on terroir that one might wish and then more. For who could not resist a glass of something that comes from “a parcel of vines that is shaped like a salted cod’s tail,” could prefer stainless steel to the oak barrels of yore, would not wish to head to Languedoc in fall, where, as vines “give their last gasp in November, a rush of jubilant color bursts into the dying leaves”? Loire, Bordeaux, Rhône, Provence: Where is the best wine in France made? There are arguments throughout for each, just as there are for the necessity for a winemaker (and many are interviewed here) to strike a fine balance between knowing how much to do and how much not to do—though Lynch repudiates the natural-wine orthodoxy that demands that the less a winemaker does, the better. A bonus is the book’s closing list of Lynch’s favorite wines, though, perhaps shocking to his hosts, not all of them are French.
A gentle education in the fine art of wine and a treat through and through for the bibulous biblio/Francophile.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-374-10097-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Oct. 27, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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