I reviewed The Winemaker by Noah Gordon. It’s amazing.
It is beautifully written and I immediately felt sympathy for the main character, Joseph Alvarez. I fell into the story and read through the night, unable to relinquish him to sleep, worried about him and what would happen next. He is the second son in a time when the whole family legacy goes to the firstborn son. He is a leaf on the wind, fated to the circumstances of his position and his lack of education and finances. Many of the villagers were resigned to their fate, but Josep was not.
“He faced the fact that he hungered to be able to do work that resulted in making something that was good.”
I struggled with Josep. I loved who he loved. I hated who he hated. I was angry when he was wronged. I rejoiced when he was finally happy. It is a lovely fairy tale, yet it is so true to life. Struggles with adversity make us stronger and we learn from our mistakes or we fail. The weaker characters in the book failed just like in real life. We must be responsible for our actions and face consequences. It is natural selection.
Josep uses his meager resources and learns quickly and relies on friends and their advice, takes risks and is open to opportunities. He rises above his humble beginnings to reach success and happiness. His emotions are raw and real without being overwhelming or disgusting. His spiritual and emotional progression to maturity is genuine and believable.
“He went on, his voice breaking, no more able to control his emotions or his words than a bull in the midst of a clumsy charge straight at the point of a sword…[then later] He was experiencing something totally unfamiliar too him, and with a shock, he recognized it as joy.”
Simply, I admire this man. I yearn for his success and happiness.
And the wine, oh, the wine! I want to taste it. And I feel like I could go plant a vineyard and grow grapes and produce a magnificent wine just from reading the book. It just sounds so adventurous, if not easy. The travel for his research must have been so fun! I must go to Spain. I must go buy some Spanish wine and eat some cheese and chorizo with tortillas.
It was like Jude the Obscure, but set in mid-nineteenth century Spain…and not quite so bleak. Happy ending!
Resentment towards his brother eventually was absolved: “Something within Josep – something small, cold, and heavy, an icy sin he had carried unknowing in his very core – melted and vanished.”
It was like The Cask of Amontillado, but with redemption. Josep did what he had to do. He was bitter. But he eventually forgave and was forgiven.
Padre Pio asked Josep: “So, where is your sin, my son?…Be tormented no more.”
Synopsis:
From the author of The Physician and Shaman now comes this story of a young man—the grapes he grows, the wine he fashions, the women he loves, and his struggle against an evil that seeks to destroy him. Already an international bestseller.
Josep Alvarez is a young man in the tiny grape-growing village of Santa Eulália, in northern Spain, where his father grows black grapes that are turned into cheap vinegar. Joseph loves the agricultural life, but he is the second son, and his father’s vineyard will be inherited by his brother Donat, the firstborn. Josep needs to keep his hands in the soil. He yearns for a job growing grapes and for an opportunity to marry Teresa Gallego.
In Madrid, an assassination plot, conceived against the political leader of Spain by men of wealth and power, creates a storm of intrigue that sucks into its vortex a group of innocent young farm workers in Santa Eulália. How Josep’s life is changed drastically by these events, and how, ironically, they gradually turn him into an inspired vintner with an evolving vision of life, is the fascinating story of The Winemaker.
About the author, Noah Gordon:
“I could think of absolutely nothing finer in the world than to become a writer,” says Noah Gordon, whose internationally bestselling novels include The Physician and Shaman.
The Physician, soon to be a motion picture, has been called a modern classic. In 1999, booksellers at the Madrid Book Fair voted it “one of the 10 best-loved books of all time.” Shaman was awarded the James Fenimore Cooper Prize for historical fiction.
Gordon describes his passions for both medical and historical fiction, as well as his near brush with a career as a doctor—before turning those interests into material for his novels.
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