175 winery profiles are featured in this book running north to south across the Roussillon region of southern France, from Maury to Banyuls-sur-mer via Perpignan and just about everywhere else in between where vineyards exist. It hopefully covers a heady mix of personal favourites including quirky 'natural' and classic traditional, 'cult' or most expensive and great-value alike, established and new-kid-on-the-block: the people and their wines. What they all have in common is catching my attention for a rich variety of reasons over the past fifteen to twenty years.
There's additional background to and some history of the Roussillon wine region touching on its vines and grapes and landscape and terrain, explanation and discussion of all the different wine styles, areas and appellations (red, white, rosé Côtes du Roussillon, Côtes du Roussillon Villages, Côtes Catalanes, Maury sec, Collioure... and the fortified Vin Doux Naturel wines: Maury, Rivesaltes and Banyuls), winemaking techniques and other exciting developments in viticulture and winemaking. As well as wine touring and sightseeing tips peppered with the odd restaurant and hotel recommendation for those wishing to explore the eminently explorable Roussillon, wild wine country.
Richard Mark James has spent more than half a lifetime dabbling in the wine world from tasting, talking, writing and blogging about wine, to translating, doing qualifications on it and even buying and selling wine. As well as passing long hours standing among vines watching them grow on the landscape, grapes being picked and transformed into fermented juice while gleaning words of wisdom from the people who do the real work farming vineyards and actually making wine. His blog is WineWriting.com with special guest 'FrenchMediterraneanWine', and he occasionally runs wine education courses and tastings in Belfast although does have a day job too working in public libraries. In a previous life, Richard lived for nearly six years in Les Pyrénées Orientales, the Roussillon region's official name or number '66', where this particular wine adventure began.
