num_pages: 368
description: Winner TopShelf Magazine Book Awards Historical Non-fiction Finalist Northern California Book Awards General Non-FictionLook. Smell. Taste. Judge. Crush is 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.For the first time Briscoe tells the complete and dramatic story of the ascendancy of California wine in vivid detail. He also profiles the larger story of California itself by looking at it from an entirely innovative perspective the state seen through its singular wine history.With dramatic flair and verve Briscoe not only recounts the history of wine and winemaking in California he encompasses a multidimensional approach that takes into account an array of social political cultural legal and winemaking sources. Elements of this history have plot lines that seem scripted by a Sophocles or Shakespeare. It is a fusion of wine personal histories cultural and socioeconomic aspects.Crush is the story of how wine from California finally gained its global due. Briscoe recounts wines often fickle affair with California now several centuries old from the first harvest and vintage through the four overwhelming catastrophes to its amazing triumph in Paris.
language: English
title: Crush: The Triumph of California Wine
publisher: University of Nevada Press