The Wine in My Glass
The Wine in My Glass
by Adrian Latimer
illustrated by Arabella Langlands-Perry
Medlar Press
ISBN: 978-1-915694-18-8
FORMAT: 234 x 156mm, 220 pages
Please note - this book is available exclusively for in-house pick-up.
Replacing his fishing rod with a corkscrew, Adrian the wine drinker sets off in search of the people, places and stories behind the bottles we all so enjoy. He uncovers the unique and beautiful places, history and people behind the wines as well as the challenges that we so rarely appreciate when we open a bottle. He does this as a layman - he’s no wine professional and this is not a book about big labels and high scores. There are precious few tasting notes but there's a wealth of stories, opinions and knowledge gleaned from winemakers, many of them very well known, and an honest - some might say too honest - appreciation of wine regions, producers and marketing in the 2020s from the perspective of someone who actually buys, understands and drinks the end product (although he’s also dabbled, not always successfully, in investing in it).
You don’t have to know about wine to enjoy this book but it’s likely that, however little or however much you knew when you started reading, you will be more appreciative of the next glass you taste by the time you reach the end. Every wine has a story to tell and Adrian is a great storyteller.
Adrian has been accompanied on his travels by his wife Kathy, who once worked in the wine trade. They met in Paris after he’d arrived there to work in insurance in 1991 and it was there that he was lucky enough to discover a wine world where a bottle of Chateau Latour could be had for just £25 and where the scores, influencers and insane prices of today were all, happily, a nightmare of the dim and distant future.
The book is exquisitely and wittily illustrated by the artist Arabella Langlands-Perry who, for many years, has worked at the famous Willi’s Wine Bar in Paris - coincidentally (or perhaps not) a favourite haunt of the Author’s.