The underdog story of how the United States came to dominate fine wine

From the author of The Audacity of Hops: The History of America's Craft Beer Revolution comes the triumphant tale of how America belted France from atop its centuries-old pedestal as the world's top wine-producing and -drinking nation. Until the mid-1970s, American fine wine was an international also-ran. Then a series of events and a group of individuals changed everything forever. This is that story. All the big players and milestones are here, from the Judgment of Paris and the French Paradox to Julia Child and Robert Parker. Told in a fast-moving, engaging style free of wine jargon, it is the first of its kind: a book focused solely on the rise of fine wine in the United States since the early 1960s, in California and elsewhere, and how that rise altered the way the world drinks--for better or worse.