Introduction

In A Hedonist in the Cellar, Jay McInerney gathers more than five years’ worth of essays and continues his exploration of what’s new, what’s enduring, and what’s surprising–giving his palate a complete workout and the reader an indispensable, idiosyncratic guide to a world of almost infinite variety. Filled with delights oenophiles everywhere will savor, this is a collection driven not only by wine itself but also the people who make it. 

An entertaining, irresistible book that is essential for anyone enthralled by the myriad pleasures of wine.

Editorial Review

Those who find most wine writing hopelessly recondite will eagerly quaff novelist Jay McInerney's A Hedonist in the Cellar, a collection of his essays originally published in House & Garden. Whether talking about a California chardonnay ("like a Ginsu blade concealed in a peach"); the wines of the Cote Rotie ("like Fitzgerald, [its] reputation was almost moribund at mid-century"); or the super Valpolicellas of Italian vintner Giuseppe Quintarelli ("his [wines] should be opened only in the presence of gods and stinky cheeses"), McInerney brings a novelist's gift and idiosyncratic wit to his personal investigations, which touch on the Rieslings from the Finger Lakes, the "forgotten whites" of Bordeaux, new developments in the wines of Chile and Argentina, spirits like Armagnac and artisinal champagnes, and much more. McInerney is a stimulating appreciator, so readers poring through his essays happily absorb viniculture and modus operandi, among other technical matters. In essays like "Translating German Labels" and "How to Impress Your Sommelier," theyâ??re also prepped in buying and ordering. A wide-ranging tour of the wine world in sum, Hedonist is for all wine lovers, who will find in it much of what's been missing from so much other wine and food writing: the wit to do it well. --Arthur Boehm

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