WineThis collection of columns from a wine obsessive who is also one of the US's best known writers of fiction is very much like many of the great wines he has encountered on his oenological travels - a little tough at the start but ultimately distinctive, illuminating and reflective of its place of origin or terroir. This is high-grade American criticism - purposeful, entertaining and informative - for an elite American audience.
Jay McInerney first came to notice with Bright Lights Big City, a morality tale of the 1980s, with its wry euphemism for cocaine, "Bolivian marching powder", one of the signature phrases of the decade.
It was at this time that he discovered wine and adopted it as his drug of choice. While studying creative writing at Syracuse University in upper New York State, he got a part-time job at a "boozeateria" called the Westland Cordial Shop, where in between entertaining occasional armed raiders and serving choice drinks such as Wild Irish Rose, he learned that his first novel had been accepted for publication. He celebrated by bringing home one of the dusty bottles of fine Bordeaux that lined the shop's top shelf. It was a 1978 Smith-Haut-Lafitte, " . . . and while, objectively speaking, it was far from the best Bordeaux I've ever had, I don't for a minute believe that wine appreciation is a strictly objective enterprise: I've gotten far less pleasure out of more expensive and highly regarded bottles of Bordeaux in the years since".
In that McInerney is in good company. Memorable wine experiences are often as much about the people with whom you share them and where you share them as the vintage itself - remember that McDonald's scene in the cult movie Sideways.
Ten years after his epiphany McInerney was asked to take on the wine column in the prestigious American magazine House & Garden. He has taken full advantage of this position to travel to the world's wine hot spots, from the old world to the new, seeking out the best and the brightest. As a celebrity writer he has had the kind of access to both wines and winemakers that can leave the rest of us salivating with envy. Names are dropped with abandon: "my friend Jancis Robinson" - one of the most influential critics - and fellow oenophile and leading British writer Julian Barnes clearly have been key to the shaping of his palate which is essentially old world-dominated with new world exceptions. He rates Bordeaux, loves Burgundy, drools over Alsace, Austria and Germany, has a big soft spot for the Rhône, embraces Champagne, especially the small producers, caresses Italy, whispers sweet nothings about Rioja, but has mixed feelings about California - haven't we all? - is gently encouraging of South Africa, surprisingly upbeat about Chile and Argentina, cautious about New Zealand and strangely silent about Australia.
His writing is not all about the juice. He celebrates individuality in people as well. So Californian maverick producer Randall Grahm of Bonny Doon fame gets the thumbs up as does the late Auberon Waugh and his visceral approach to wine criticism. His own language is colourful, intelligent and witty. Here is his description of a St Emilion superstar: "Cheval Blanc is approachable and even delicious in its youth, and yet it continues to develop over the decades. Imagine a child star who remains a top box-office draw into her sixties". He has the journalistic ability to pare down detail, technical and personal, to what is required in an 800-word chapter or column, and the writerly technique to do that well.
He is also blessed with good taste - at least by my reckoning. Of the wines I recognised there is little to disagree with in his pithy comments and his general approach to wine and winemakers is sound. He does have a tendency to pick the best and therefore there is little new in the pronouncement that Bordeaux first growth (ie top star) Haut Brion is an amazing wine. Few will ever get the opportunity to judge for themselves. But his missive from the front line of hedonism is welcome if only for the colourful confirmation that, yes, great wine does taste great, and that an oenological life sure is good. Wish you were here, he seems to be saying, though really, like any elitist worth his case of first growth, he's glad you aren't.
Joe Breen writes a weekly column on wine in The Irish Times Saturday Magazine
A Hedonist in the Cellar: Adventures in Wine By Jay McInerney Bloomsbury, 243pp. £14.99