A Hedonist in the Cellar by Jay McInerney

Reading Jay McInerney's book, A Hedonist in the Cellar reminds me of a Greek word called "pikilia". When my husband I went to Greece, we had a plate of "pikilia" or "assortment" at the foot of the Acropolis in the Plaka area. Our host, also used the word, "pikilia" to describe the high throughput sightseeing that we were doing in Greece when we went to see many of the major ruins in the span of 10 days. You can read McInerney's book from cover to cover, which is what I did the first time, but you can also select little stories to read which have such engaging titles that it pulls you in to find out what its all about. The stories are short and they all have some interesting point to make. For example, "The Shedistas of Santa Barbara" are about a group of people making wine in sheds! Kris Curran is mentioned as an example of a shedista---she makes Sea Smoke! McInerney also has a story about one of our favorite wines, Lopez de Heredia. There are stories on what to drink with Asian cuisine and also what to drink with asparagus. I was intrigued by the story called "Monk Business The Secrets of Chartruese". I had never heard of Chartruese and this story piqued my imagination. I think someone like Dan Brown should write a book about it, a la his "The Da Vinci Code". This was a fun read.