Publisher's Synopsis
On the gentle banks of the Gironde the vendange engages the entire community. They labour furiously to serve an ancient English family, the Cunninghams, whose magnificent vintages can sell for hundreds of pounds. Cecilia Harman, struggling to discover her vocation, works the sweltering fields from the fresh promise of dawn until the exhausted sun sets. Then, her limbs aching, her skin burning, she enjoys the raucous company of her fellow vendangeurs as the night deepens; nights lively with food, stories and song, and the ever-flowing jugs of wine. Soon she finds herself absorbed into the decadent lives of the Cunninghams. But what is the secret of their wine? Is it the soil, the climate, the blending, or the ageing? Or are there stranger influences that govern the ripening of the dark grapes, that bud and fatten along the creeping green tendrils; struggling every year from the twisted stumps of the ancient vines? What is hidden inside the silent rooms of The Mater Suite in the deserted East wing of the grand Chateau? Who leaves flowers and letters in the family mausoleum? As the months pass the land continues its cycle of the seasons, working deep transformative magic from the composted past; in time the sorcery of terroir reveals its truth.
