Reading the History of California Wine

This book tells the 200-year story of the heady dream that wines as good as the greatest of France could be made in California. A dream dashed four times in merciless succession until it was ultimately realized in a stunning blind tasting in Paris. In that tasting, in the year of America's bicentennial, California wines took their place as the leading wines of the world.

Here is the complete and dramatic story of the ascendancy of California wine in vivid detail. It also looks at the larger story of California itself through its singular wine history.