WineLife365

Are You A “Vayniac” Yet?  If you’re a serious wine drinker thirsty for great wine advice, then chances are you’ve either heard the name Gary Vaynerchuk around the water cooler at work or felt his “thunder” as he boldly and energetically voices his strong opinions about every wine under the sun on his video podcast called “Wine Library TV”. 

Gary V., as he is affectionately called, is currently the undisputed champion in the wine blogosphere arena and shows no signs of slowing down.  Legions of wine lovers flock to his site daily to watch him unleash the “thunder” as he calls it.  Viewers are attracted to his entertaining, unique and often times outrageous comments that are a far cry from the old and stuffy traditional wine chatterboxes.  His approach to wine is simple:  He takes out the “foo-foo” Masterpiece Theatre bullshit explanations and uses words that the “Average Wine Joe” can understand.  In other words, he’s fresh, engaging and makes drinking wine fun, exciting, and social – the way it was meant to be.

Gary Vaynerchuk’s 101 Wines, follows the same perfect recipe as his Wine Library TV podcast.  He offers readers 101 wine recommendations in a down–to-earth, funny, and easy to understand level.  Through all his years in the wine business, he’s never lost sight of the fact that wine is supposed to be fun and adventurous.

Still, 101 Wines does have a few questionable deterrents, such as the book feeling sort of like a Gary V. sales brochure.   Mr. Vaynerchuk can do more in this case than just tantalize your palate with these wonderful wines that he highlights in his book – he can also conveniently sell them to you on his website because he’s also a licensed wine merchant.  Another thing that bothered me about this book was the fact that so many of these terrific sounding wines are not going to be available in most places because a high percentage of his recommendations produced so few cases.  I mean, they sound very enticing, but how can this book be used as a wine buying guide for everyone, when everyone is just not going to have any luck finding them in their neck of the woods?

All in all, 101 Wines: Guaranteed To Inspire, Delight, And Bring Thunder To Your World, certainly achieves what the title intended in my opinion, with the exception of offering more selections that the general public can actually get their hands on at a price level that most people can swallow.

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