Hints of Dried Weeds? Essence of Fig? New Gift Book Reveals the Real Story in Your Wine Glass

NAPA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--December 1st marked the release of Once Upon A Vine: The Secret Stories of California’s Artisan Wineries ($20, paperback) by wine writer Judy Reynolds. It is a unique and welcome addition to the crowded wine book universe, available at www.OnceUponAVineTheBook.com.

What’s been missing from the bookstore shelf, Reynolds suggests, “is a connection to the people who dream the wine – the artisan winemakers. Their stories are wine’s secret ingredient, the one people fall in love with and remember. Those stories bring wine to life, not a wine’s award count, or the idea it smells like dried weeds and tastes like essence of fig.”

Once Upon A Vine shares the stories of 24 winemakers and “champions the artisan wine movement while humanizing the world of wine for all who read it,” says one food/wine expert.

“Once Upon A Vine created for me a whole new way of understanding the world of wine,” agrees actress and artist Jane Seymour in her Foreword to the book.

Traveling the California wine country as a writer since 1990, authoring more than 100 wine newsletters annually, Reynolds discovered that wine’s real attraction is the people who imagined it in the first place.

People like Santa Barbara’s Lane Tanner, who Fate and the legendary wine giant André Tchelistcheff had to shove through the cellar door.

Or Jess Madrigal, who started out with nothing but a pair of pruning shears to build one of the Napa Valley’s most successful small family wineries.

Or Ames Morison and Christopher Medlock James, who are creating an environmental Eden for winegrowing while bottling one of the best Cabernet/Merlot blends anywhere for under $30.

Reynolds believes that many are turned off by an industry that frequently seems clueless about the real charms of its product. “So many wineries don’t understand that it’s not how they planted the vines that excites people, it’s why they planted the vines in the first place.”

Not a wine tasting guide, not a tour book, not a wine education course, this book offers a whole new way to open the cellar door for anyone with any interest in wine. Once Upon A Vine uncorks true life stories, sagas about choices made, luck, hope and dreams realized that can both inspire the reader - and clarify the choices at the wine shop. “When you know a winery’s secret story,” Reynolds concludes, “you’ll always remember the wine.”

For excerpts, visit www.OnceUponAVineTheBook.com.