Italy's Native Wine Grape Terroirs

I have never seen a wine book like this. Ian D'Agata is a prize-winning writer on Italian wines. With this brand-new volume, he offers up the chemistry, geology, and lore of Italian wine terroirs. Following introductory material on Italy, terroir, the problem with Italian appellations, and his approach, he takes up major and lessser-known grape varietals. The discussion includes pertinent geologic background, observations on climate and growing conditions, chemistry, history, and critical assessments. After each section there is a list of Benchmark Wines. The chapter on Nebbiolo alone is more than 40 pages.As erudite as he is, D'Agata is also a splendid and witty writer. He begins his Introduction noting that if you walk into a wine bar today, "you will find the place so crammed with glass-swirling terroiristes it's almost immoral." Discussing the intricacy of the study on which he is launched, he comments, "Of course, this being Italy, where if something is complicated it's good and if it is more complicated it's even better, you just know it will be intricate going." And while that is clearly true, it is also a pleasure.The University of California deserves much praise for having published this excellent book. It has separate indices of grape varietals and the terroirs, appendices concerning geologic time, the prevalent geologic substrates and ages of the various terroirs and their topography, a glossary, a bibliography, and a general index. If you read D'Agata's superb treatise, you will be entertained, informed, and grow in love and understanding of Italy and its many wines.

La profundidad con que Ian D'Agata aborda cada tema es destacada. Desborda de conocimientos y de ejemplos, asociados a las numerosas cepas italianas.

Inconceivable that a terroir book would not be filled with illustrations, photographs and maps. A nice written summary of characteristics, but terroir is about PLACE - and understanding and appreciating place requires maps, photos, cross-sections, etc. etc.

the style is too colloquial and pretentious, many opinions rather than facts, many inaccuracies (e.g. the effect of the soil on the wines mistakenly confused with the effect of the climate), too much emphasis on stuff that has very little effect on wine just for showing off knowledge... it could have been a great book but in the end it fails. Very journalistic in style rather than academic.

No maps or pictures, super wordy. Like too wordy.

Being a sommelier, if Ian D'Agata writes (or speaks) about it; I am reading it!

Pour tous les passionnés de vins italiens, ce livre est une bible très détaillée des cépages italiens et de leurs caractéristiques.

Took with us to italy and was ideal for reading about the areas as we went round

Il libro è molto interessante, ma abbastanza incompleto. Un lavoro simile per ogni varietà sarebbe stato molto difficile ed avrebbe richiesto più volumi. Inoltre, è innegabile che moltissime varietà italiane, ben descritte nell'altro libro di D'Agata "Native grapes of Italy", non abbiano un terroir paragonabile alle uve qui descritte.Detto questo, alcune scelte mi sono sembrate strane. Restando nel veneto, viene descritta la dorona, varietà interessante ma limitata al momento, e viene ignorata la zona del Piave.Nella descrizione del libro sarebbe stato interessante avere una lista delle varietà descritte.

Fantastic book, well researched. Written with a good sense of humour, easy to read. I work with wine, for me it's full of useful facts.

Bien écrit, divertissant, bien documenté, par le plus grand expert du monde sur les cépages indigènes et les vins italiens. Incontournable pour les amateurs de vin et les professionnels.