The Booklovers' Guide to Wine

A Celebration of the History, the Mysteries and the Literary Pleasures of Drinking Wine

By: Patrick Alexander

Narrated by: Brian Hilario

Number one Amazon new release!

Great wines and great writers are a wonderful blend.

A fact-filled, jargon-free guide to wine, bursting with entertaining anecdotes, literary quotes, and compelling humor that will teach you everything you always wanted to learn about wine but were too scared to ask.

The pleasures of great wine and great writers.

Under the careful guidance of his father, Patrick Alexander began drinking wine with his meals at the age of five. At the same age, encouraged by his mother, he began a lifelong love affair with books. The twin pleasures of wine and writing remained his passion for the next 65 years. He has raised his own children in many of the world’s great wine-growing regions, from Bordeaux and Piedmont in Europe to the Santa Cruz mountains of California while researching and writing his definitive guide to the novels of Marcel Proust.

History of wine and some of the best wines.

For the past six years, Patrick has been teaching a sold-out wine appreciation class at the nation’s number one independent bookstore, Books & Books in Coral Gables, Florida. The Booklovers' Guide to Wine is based on this very successful class and blends Patrick’s passion for the culture and history of wine and his love of literature for the world's great writers.

A literary twist on traditional food and wine pairings, this book explores how great wines and great writers can be combined to enhance the enjoyment of both. The book describes the history of wine from the time of Noah to the birth of two-buck Chuck.

Pure delight.

"This book would be a highly recommendable primer on wine without the literary references as Alexander guides us through regions and grapes, plus how to truly appreciate this nectar. But the hefty chapter matching grapes with authors is pure delight: albariño and J.R.R. Tolkien, chardonnay and Jane Austen, and his personal favorite, gewürztraminer and Marcel Proust." (Minneapolis Star Tribune)

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Great information, but it needs to be read by someone who knows the subject!

The information presented in this book is well written and easy to follow. The subject was covered in some depth while staying fairly light and pleasant. HOWEVER, the narrator of this book was NOT familiar with the subject (wine), at least his pronunciation of grape types, locations throughout the world, and many other items were horrid. Many terms and names are pronounced according to their origin, yet this narrator just stated them as if he had never seen or heard any of them before. I.e., Chablis, is pronounced “Sha-blee”, not “Cha-bliss”!!! That is just one of MANY mispronunciations littered throughout this narration. Subject matter = 5 stars; narrator = 0 stars!!!

Great information - Not so great narration

This book is a really great source for wine lovers, especially if you are new to wine. The author has a fun "voice" and doesn't take himself too seriously (which can be a problem with some wine books). I loved the personal anecdotes and stories. However, the narrator was not good. I don't think it would've been too much to ask for the narrator to have been familiar with basic wine terminology, types of grapes and growing regions. That was not the case with this narrator. If a word could be mispronounced, it was. Who pronounces cabernet with a hard "T" or pronounces the "ss" in chabliss? I about choked with "boojalace." And this is as much on the producers and editors as it is the narrator. I would recommend this book, but not the audio version. If Hilario could've just pronounced words correctly, this would've been a homerun listen. My only quibble is with his pronunciation. Everything else with his narration was fine.

Monty Python Reads Wine

After putting up with hours of mis-pronunciation I finally gave up. Couldn't concentrate on the content which is basic. BTW wine is made, not grown. If you don't know wine please don't listen to this. Read it.

Let's play guess the term:

Alsauce
Pro-vince
Cheeanti
Jurez
Saw-ter-nay
Boojolais
Chableez
Dan-OOO-bee (the river)
Valpolosella
Sin-queemie cru

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