A Good YearA Good Year
Title rated 3.85 out of 5 stars, based on 70 ratings(70 ratings)
Book, 2004
Current format, Book, 2004, , Available .Book, 2004
Current format, Book, 2004, , Available . Offered in 0 more formatsHaving lost his biggest client to an unscrupulous boss, Max Skinner journeys to Provence to inspect a vineyard he has inherited and finds additional challenges in a California woman's claim on the estate.
Having lost his biggest client to an unscrupulous boss, Max Skinner journeys to Provence to inspect a vineyard he has inherited and finds additional challenges in the vineyard's inferior wine and a California woman's claim on the estate. By the author of Anything Considered. 175,000 first printing.
Max Skinner is a man at the heart of London's financial universe. He works for the notorious Lawton Brothers at the top end of Threadneedle Street, and his is a life of long hours and fierce competition with Amis, his nemesis and boss. It is a rivalry that continues until the day Max finds the Lawton Brothers doing a little asset-stripping of their own. Himself.
Amid the London drizzle, there is one potential ray of sunshine in Max's life. His Uncle Henry has left him his estate in his will - an eighteenth-century house and vineyard an hour's drive from Avignon, where Max used to go for his childhood holidays. Out of a job, and encouraged by his friend Charlie's talk of the money in modern wine, he heads for France to assess its potential.
What Max discovers is even better than he remembered: a beautiful house, wonderful weather and a bustling village in the shape of St. Pons. The only downside to his new life is the quality of the wine in the vineyard and the brooding presence of Roussel, a former employee of his uncle. When Max suggests getting in an expert to look at the vineyards, Roussel, for reasons that slowly unravel, is resistant. And then there's the arrival of a mysterious stranger from California.
From Peter Mayle, a wonderful new novel steeped in wine—and the business of wine?and set in, bien sûr, Provence.
Max Skinner is not exactly setting the London financial world on fire?and when his supervisor steals his biggest client, it’s definitely time to inspect the vineyard in Provence that his recently departed uncle left him. Heartily and happily distracted upon his arrival by the landscape, the weather, and the food?not to mention the gorgeous notaire handling the estate and the stunning owner of the local bistro?Max almost forgets about his inherited property.
Which might have been a good idea, because the wine produced there is swill. But then why, Max has to wonder, is his caretaker so anxious to acquire the land? When a beautiful young woman from California arrives with what might be a legitimate claim on the estate, and knowledge of vineyards that far outstrips Max’s own, the plot begins its twists and turns into and out of truly wonderful complications and resolutions.
This is luscious reading?soothing us with the sensual wonders of Provence while it tells a fascinating tale of the hugely lucrative and competitive boutique-wine trade. It is Peter Mayle’s most satisfying, most delectable novel yet.
Having lost his biggest client to an unscrupulous boss, Max Skinner journeys to Provence to inspect a vineyard he has inherited and finds additional challenges in the vineyard's inferior wine and a California woman's claim on the estate. By the author of Anything Considered. 175,000 first printing.
Max Skinner is a man at the heart of London's financial universe. He works for the notorious Lawton Brothers at the top end of Threadneedle Street, and his is a life of long hours and fierce competition with Amis, his nemesis and boss. It is a rivalry that continues until the day Max finds the Lawton Brothers doing a little asset-stripping of their own. Himself.
Amid the London drizzle, there is one potential ray of sunshine in Max's life. His Uncle Henry has left him his estate in his will - an eighteenth-century house and vineyard an hour's drive from Avignon, where Max used to go for his childhood holidays. Out of a job, and encouraged by his friend Charlie's talk of the money in modern wine, he heads for France to assess its potential.
What Max discovers is even better than he remembered: a beautiful house, wonderful weather and a bustling village in the shape of St. Pons. The only downside to his new life is the quality of the wine in the vineyard and the brooding presence of Roussel, a former employee of his uncle. When Max suggests getting in an expert to look at the vineyards, Roussel, for reasons that slowly unravel, is resistant. And then there's the arrival of a mysterious stranger from California.
From Peter Mayle, a wonderful new novel steeped in wine—and the business of wine?and set in, bien sûr, Provence.
Max Skinner is not exactly setting the London financial world on fire?and when his supervisor steals his biggest client, it’s definitely time to inspect the vineyard in Provence that his recently departed uncle left him. Heartily and happily distracted upon his arrival by the landscape, the weather, and the food?not to mention the gorgeous notaire handling the estate and the stunning owner of the local bistro?Max almost forgets about his inherited property.
Which might have been a good idea, because the wine produced there is swill. But then why, Max has to wonder, is his caretaker so anxious to acquire the land? When a beautiful young woman from California arrives with what might be a legitimate claim on the estate, and knowledge of vineyards that far outstrips Max’s own, the plot begins its twists and turns into and out of truly wonderful complications and resolutions.
This is luscious reading?soothing us with the sensual wonders of Provence while it tells a fascinating tale of the hugely lucrative and competitive boutique-wine trade. It is Peter Mayle’s most satisfying, most delectable novel yet.
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- New York : Alfred A. Knopf, c2004.
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