For the price of a mediocre Merlot, you can find out what happens to Miles and Jack after Sideways. You liked the movie right?
I'm just saying. I like the characters, though it's really hard to picture them as anyone other than Paul Giamatti and Thomas Hayden Church. In the end, it doesn't matter because you just want to know what's going to happen next. The empathy and scorn you felt from the movie will touch you again.
I'm no spoiler. But I'll say that I've never read a book that blurs the lines between reality and fiction in this peculiar way. Miles has written "Shameless" and has turned the wine world on its end. The lines are further blurred between Miles and the real author, Rex Pickett --in the influence on the wine industry (the skyrocketing success of Pinots and the Challenger disaster to Merlots that followed the release of the movie), and the wine-soaked fame I'm sure has followed Rex Pickett since the movie was released. Hell, even Virginia Masden (Maya) was invited to speak at wine events when Sideways hit. (I see Rex is speaking at the IPNC in July - so life imitates art).
Parts of this book are me.Parts of it are you too, if you're close enough to the wine world to be reading this. I wasn't 25% through the book when he talks about Domaines Mugneret-Gibourg and I looked over and my wine glass was sitting on a plaster coaster that Marie-Andrée, the owner,gave me at the Domaine! Over and over again, Mr. Pickett will have you reminiscing about a wine he mentions that you love, or sends you to madly Google something he has mentioned. (Lots of obscure Pinot to discover here)--and Mr. Pickett knows his stuff. Best go ahead and buy it from the author's site.
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