by Tom Acitelli ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 2015
A tasty combination of commercial and culinary history reflecting the maturations of the wine business and Americans’ taste...
In an appropriate follow-up to The Audacity of Hops: The History of America’s Craft Beer Revolution (2013), Curbed Boston founding editor Acitelli wades into the colorful history of American fine wine, showing how, in 2014, the United States surpassed France to become the largest wine market in the world.
After an account of Julia Child’s alteration of Americans’ taste and culinary habits, the author steps back in time to recount America’s tangled relationship with wine, which resulted from Prohibition and its repeal and the trends in the 1950s, when the sale of unremarkable, mass-produced wines reached a peak. Acitelli then depicts how fine wines, defined as “any drier, non-fortified wine, at any price point, made primarily from higher-end grape types that originated in Europe,” at first nudged, then slowly replaced the undistinguished American wines. In mostly chronological fashion, the author effectively pulls together the stories of a diverse cast of characters with innovations in winemaking and marketing as well as popular culture, illustrating how wine shifted from either an undistinguished drink or a rare and expensive treat to a mainstream grocery item. Acitelli cites the importance of early wine critics such as Robert Lawrence Balzer, whose Beverly Hills Citizen columns served as the beginnings of wine criticism; and Ruth Ellen Church, who wrote “the nation’s first weekly wine column in the Chicago Tribune.” The author digs into the histories of America’s early winemakers—e.g., the Gallo and Mondavi families—as well as lesser-known but important individuals in the winemaking world such as artisan Joe Heitz or viticulture researcher Albert Winkler. Acitelli also recalls the infamous wine competition known as the 1976 Judgment of Paris, the evolution of wine bars, and how the exploding interest in local foods and numerous wine bloggers have contributed to the popularity and ubiquity of fine wines in America’s culinary scene.
A tasty combination of commercial and culinary history reflecting the maturations of the wine business and Americans’ taste buds.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-56976-167-0
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Chicago Review Press
Review Posted Online: June 7, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2015
Share your opinion of this book
More by Tom Acitelli
BOOK REVIEW
by Tom Acitelli
BOOK REVIEW
by Tom Acitelli
by Erin Meyer ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 27, 2014
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.
A helpful guide to working effectively with people from other cultures.
“The sad truth is that the vast majority of managers who conduct business internationally have little understanding about how culture is impacting their work,” writes Meyer, a professor at INSEAD, an international business school. Yet they face a wider array of work styles than ever before in dealing with clients, suppliers and colleagues from around the world. When is it best to speak or stay quiet? What is the role of the leader in the room? When working with foreign business people, failing to take cultural differences into account can lead to frustration, misunderstanding or worse. Based on research and her experiences teaching cross-cultural behaviors to executive students, the author examines a handful of key areas. Among others, they include communicating (Anglo-Saxons are explicit; Asians communicate implicitly, requiring listeners to read between the lines), developing a sense of trust (Brazilians do it over long lunches), and decision-making (Germans rely on consensus, Americans on one decider). In each area, the author provides a “culture map scale” that positions behaviors in more than 20 countries along a continuum, allowing readers to anticipate the preferences of individuals from a particular country: Do they like direct or indirect negative feedback? Are they rigid or flexible regarding deadlines? Do they favor verbal or written commitments? And so on. Meyer discusses managers who have faced perplexing situations, such as knowledgeable team members who fail to speak up in meetings or Indians who offer a puzzling half-shake, half-nod of the head. Cultural differences—not personality quirks—are the motivating factors behind many behavioral styles. Depending on our cultures, we understand the world in a particular way, find certain arguments persuasive or lacking merit, and consider some ways of making decisions or measuring time natural and others quite strange.
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.Pub Date: May 27, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-61039-250-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2014
Share your opinion of this book
by Abhijit V. Banerjee & Esther Duflo ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 12, 2019
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.
“Quality of life means more than just consumption”: Two MIT economists urge that a smarter, more politically aware economics be brought to bear on social issues.
It’s no secret, write Banerjee and Duflo (co-authors: Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way To Fight Global Poverty, 2011), that “we seem to have fallen on hard times.” Immigration, trade, inequality, and taxation problems present themselves daily, and they seem to be intractable. Economics can be put to use in figuring out these big-issue questions. Data can be adduced, for example, to answer the question of whether immigration tends to suppress wages. The answer: “There is no evidence low-skilled migration to rich countries drives wage and employment down for the natives.” In fact, it opens up opportunities for those natives by freeing them to look for better work. The problem becomes thornier when it comes to the matter of free trade; as the authors observe, “left-behind people live in left-behind places,” which explains why regional poverty descended on Appalachia when so many manufacturing jobs left for China in the age of globalism, leaving behind not just left-behind people but also people ripe for exploitation by nationalist politicians. The authors add, interestingly, that the same thing occurred in parts of Germany, Spain, and Norway that fell victim to the “China shock.” In what they call a “slightly technical aside,” they build a case for addressing trade issues not with trade wars but with consumption taxes: “It makes no sense to ask agricultural workers to lose their jobs just so steelworkers can keep theirs, which is what tariffs accomplish.” Policymakers might want to consider such counsel, especially when it is coupled with the observation that free trade benefits workers in poor countries but punishes workers in rich ones.
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-61039-950-0
Page Count: 432
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: Aug. 28, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
Share your opinion of this book
More About This Book
SEEN & HEARD
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Hey there, book lover.
We’re glad you found a book that interests you!
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Don’t fret. We’ll find you.