Laura Dave: Eight Hundred Grapes: a perfect summer escape to a sun-drenched vineyard

Published by HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2015

Copyright © Laura Dave 2015

Cover layout design © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2015

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Laura Dave asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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Ebook Edition © July 2015 ISBN: 9780008129378

Version: 2015-07-02

J.

Without you, there probably wouldn’t be a novel …

There certainly wouldn’t be such great wine

You have to grow about eight hundred grapes to get just one bottle of wine. If that isn’t an argument to finish the bottle, I don’t know what is.

—Anonymous

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Epigraph You have to grow about eight hundred grapes to get just one bottle of wine. If that isn’t an argument to finish the bottle, I don’t know what is. —Anonymous

Part 1: The Grapes

Sebastopol, California. Six months ago

The Last Straw

Regarding Henry

The Contract

The Secateurs

Sebastopol, California. 1979

Mr. McCarthy

A Guy Named Mark and a Guy Named Jesse

The Wedding Crashers

Sebastopol, California. 1984

The View from 8 A.M., the Last Sunday of the Harvest

The Wine Thief

The Ride Home

Grown, Produced, and Bottled

Part 2: The Crush

Ben and Maddie and Georgia and Jacob

Sebastopol, California. 1989

The Terroir Has a Story

The Last Family Dinner (Part 1)

Spontaneous Fermentation (and Other Ways to Lose the Love of Your Life)

Sebastopol, California. 1994

The Last Family Dinner (Part 2)

Exile on Main Street

The Vintner Drinks Alone

Pancakes at The Violet Café

Perfect Red

Sebastopol, California. 1999

Home

The History of Wine

Note by Note

Falling Out of Sync

No Secrets

Part 3: The Union

An Invitation

People Who Screw Up

High Yields

The Starkville City Jail

The Wine Cave

Sebastopol, California. 2004

Have-to-Have

The Harvest Party

A Few Good Men

The Defrosting

Synchronization

Part 4: The Last Harvest

The Waiting Room

Sebastopol, California. 2009

The Details

The First Contract

The Other Line

Everything Worth Doing

The Wedding

Part 5: An Unnamed Vineyard

Sebastopol, California. Present day

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by Laura Dave

About the Publisher