Eight Hundred Grapes
Laura Dave, 2015
Simon & Schuster
272 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781476789255
Summary
There are secrets you share, and secrets you hide….
Growing up on her family’s Sonoma vineyard, Georgia Ford learned some important secrets. The secret number of grapes it takes to make a bottle of wine: eight hundred. The secret ingredient in her mother’s lasagna: chocolate. The secret behind ending a fight: hold hands.
But just a week before her wedding, thirty-year-old Georgia discovers her beloved fiancé has been keeping a secret so explosive, it will change their lives forever.
Georgia does what she’s always done: she returns to the family vineyard, expecting the comfort of her long-married parents, and her brothers, and everything familiar. But it turns out her fiancé is not the only one who’s been keeping secrets….
Eight Hundred Grapes is a heartbreaking, funny, and deeply evocative novel about love, marriage, family, wine, and the treacherous terrain in which they all intersect. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—July 18, 1977
• Raised—Scarsdale, New York, USA
• Education—B.A., University of Pennsylvania; M.F.A., University of Virginia
• Awards—Association of Writers and Writing Programs Intro Award
• Currently—lives in Los Angeles, California
Laura Dave is an American author of several novels, including London Is The Best City In America (2006), The Divorce Party (2008), The First Husband (2011), and Eight Hundred Grapes (2015). She most often writes about relationships, family, infidelity, and marriage.
Dave, whose interest in writing began in elementary school, grew up in Scarsdale, New York. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1999 with a B.A. in English and from the University of Virginia with an M.F.A. in creative writing. She was a Henry Hoyns Fellow and a recipient of the Tennessee Williams Scholarship. She received several awards for her writing including the AWP Intro Award in Short Fiction.
After graduate school, Dave worked as a freelance journalist for ESPN.
In addition to her novels, Dave's short fiction and essays have been published in the New York Times, New York Observer, ESPN, Redbook, and Huffington Post. She has appeared on CBS's The Early Show, Fox News Channel's Fox & Friends and NPR's All Things Considered. In 2008, Cosmopolitan named her a "Fun and Fearless Phenom of the Year.
She lives with her screenwriter husband, Josh Singer, in Los Angeles, California. (Adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 9/3/2015.)
Book Reviews
Secrets and love affairs on a Sonoma vineyard mean reading with wine is basically mandatory.
Cosmopolitan
Need a vacation? Dave will transport you with mouthwatering lasagna, breathtaking vistas—and an unforgettable lesson in loyalty.
Glamour
The idyllic life of Georgia Ford is crashing down—oh, and it’s just days before her wedding. Cue cold feet.
Marie Claire
Dave’s tightly woven family drama is best enjoyed with a glass of wine (or two); readers found this one impossible to put down. (#1 Reader's Prize Selection)
Elle
This novel’s hero discovers the complexity of human relationships and desires amid the well-researched backdrop of a fictional Sonoma winery.
Wine Enthusiast
[C]harms and pulls at the heartstrings...well-crafted.... [T]he author throws in a few secrets about winemaking—in fact, the title is a reference to the number of grapes needed to produce a bottle of wine. This winning tale will...satisfy on a literary level....[A] tasty treat.
Publishers Weekly
Fast-moving chapters and snappy dialog make this a quick, breezy, perfect beach read, but the story would improve if the protagonist had some romantic love scenes and a bit more passion.... [Laura Dave] is gaining a following and finding her spot next to the likes of Emily Giffin and Nancy Thayer. —Sonia Reppe, Stickney-Forest View P.L., IL
Library Journal
Through a series of flashbacks that range from canny to cloying, we learn how the Ford family has reached [their] collective crisis point. Resolutions arrive slowly and often unexpectedly for each of them, giving this satisfying novel legs.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Discuss the myth of the yellow VW bug and the Ford family’s belief in "synchronization" as opposed to fate. How does this theory evolve over the course of the novel?
2. Do you think Georgia feels she has agency in the beginning of the story? The end? Is she right?
3. Georgia has made a lot of life choices to avoid repeating an upbringing that involved unpredictability. How does your life resist or yield to your own childhood? Discuss how that relates to the definition of "concerto" and its varying degrees of cooperation and opposition.
4. As twins, Finn and Bobby are often at odds with each other. In what ways do you think they are alike? Why do you think it’s so difficult for them to connect?
5. The one common denominator for the Ford siblings is love of their mother’s lasagna. Do you have a similar tradition in your family? What brings you together, no matter what?
6. Discuss the role of the contract that Georgia asks her brothers to sign. Why is she so afraid of the vineyard? Can you relate?
7. How does forgiveness play into this story? Could you forgive Ben for hiding Maddie? Could you forgive Finn for kissing Margaret?
8. Georgia insists on doing everything in her power to stop her loved ones from doing something they’ll regret. Discuss her mother’s response, "But which way is regret?" What do you think she means here?
9. Why is Jacob unexpectedly appealing to Georgia? Discuss their similarities, both in personality and life paths.
10. Georgia’s father has many rules of winemaking, like: "If you do your job," then, "you make good soil." He also has "a theory that what was equally as important as the wine you presented in your vintage was the wine you left out of the vintage. In winemaking, this was known as declassification." How do these rules apply to decision making on a larger scale? Do you think Georgia abides by them?
11. Who are Georgia’s "have-to-haves" at the end of the novel? Who are the have-to-haves in your own life?
12. Ben takes full responsibility for lying, but Finn points out that Georgia wasn’t necessarily tuned in to her fiancé. Discuss whether there are two sides to every conflict, even when something seems black and white.
13. Do you think that Georgia will be happy running the vineyard and being with Jacob? Why or why not? What’s the biggest lesson she has learned?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)
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