Corked

What a beautiful story. Though Father's Day has just passed, this makes a great gift any time of the year. I laughed, I cried, I drank, I passed out, I woke up and read some more. This story pulls you right in and doesn't let go until the last page and ANYONE can enjoy it as much as I did!

Some readers need over the top heroes and heroines in the books they enjoy. They like predictable characters doing predictable things. For the purpose of this review,I am not one of those readers and this is not one of those books. Where some take offence to Kathryn Borel's candor and self-deprecating style, I continue to champion this book to any reader who feels they do not get off on the status quo. The book is full of unexpected self exposure and is laugh out loud funny in several passages. You don't have to identify with the author to appreciate her ability to be honest about herself, a quality that is mostly lacking in a self-denial obsessed society. Critiquing this book from a pompous-ass perspective is like wine tasting with predjudice. If Corked were a wine, it would be a lovely Meritage and as with wine, it is best enjoyed without pretense.

Corked is as much about Wine as the film Sideways was, which is to say that wine provides a device to get to what actually matters in this memoir, which is dysfunction and redemption. Kathryn Borel Jr.'s writing style is brash and she shows a keenly-honed, acerbic wit, a knack for self-deprecating humor and a penchant for shock value throughout. This means that this is *not* something I'd recommend everyone read, just as I wouldn't recommend, say, Hunter S. Thompson's work to everybody. At times, it leaves the reader with the uncomfortable sense of voyeurism. This, I imagine, is behind the offense that the stuffed shirts and snooty pseudo-sommeliers have apparently taken to the book. That's a good sign, because those are precisely the types that one should not take literary opinions from. What shines in Corked is Borel's willingness to unflinchingly lay bare her innermost secrets and personal foibles. This would certainly be courageous for anyone to do, let alone a writer at the very start of her literary career and much of popular culture demonstrates our society's fixation with such. That Borel is not the demure, proper flower those in Wine Country may wish all young women to be makes this book that much more vital. Like the car accident that haunts this book, it's not a pretty sight to behold, but it's impossible to look away from. If you are looking for a polite, inoffensive read primarily about wine, get as far as you can from this book. But if you're looking for a brutally-honest and often hilarious account of a young woman and the bond she shares with her eccentric father, you could do far worse than Corked.

I really enjoyed Kathryn Borel's memoir. Apparently I am in the minority but I found it to be truly an engaging book with a great father/daughter story at the core. It's rare that you see this angle in books and I find it fascinating. Perhaps because the area is lacking in my own life. I cringed with the author as she told the embarrassing adventures on a wine trip with her father. I also empathized with some of her past mistakes. At times I felt myself cheering along side her father, encouraging the author to get over it and move on. I think this memoir was honest, very real, and at times I didn't adore Kathryn but that's what made it real. I did not pick this novel for the wine aspect, I didn't find it to be too important in the context of the entire novel either. I enjoyed what was in it since I don't know much about wine myself and found it a learning experience.