The 29th edition of Australian Wine Vintages, or the 'Gold Book' as it is affectionately known, offers more than ever before to wine drinkers and collectors. This new edition has over 4000 wine reviews and focuses on the highest quality producers and wines which represent excellent value.

A landmark in Australian wine publishing. Superbly crafted and uncompromisingly presented, this limited-edition collectors' item of original photographs and words lives the story of one of the world's most celebrated wines.

The Vintage and the Gleaning is set in a winemaking town in the north-east of Victoria, close to the Murray River. Smithy is a retired shearer turned vineyard worker who has recently been forced to give up drinking after a lifetime of alcoholism. In his new sobriety he is contemplating the world in which he lives and the man he has been and become with a new understanding. Assaulted by long forgotten memories, Smithy is forced to take stock of his own past. Overwhelmed with feelings of regret, guilt, loss and nostalgia for the past, Smithy is trapped in a blind search for meaning as he realises that he cannot undo the repercussions of his wasted life. He is a desperate and lonely old man seeking beauty in an ugly world. Living in the same town is Charlotte, a young woman in a dangerous relationship, whose misfortunes have led her into an uneasy friendship with Smithy. It is in his confused and ultimately futile attempts to help Charlotte that he seeks redemption.

From the publisher of Pipette Magazine, discover a natural wine-soaked memoir about finding your passion—and falling in love. It was Rachel Signer's dream to be that girl: the one smoking hand-rolled cigarettes out the windows of her 19th-century Parisian studio apartment, wearing second-hand Isabel Marant jeans and sipping a glass of Beaujolais redolent of crushed roses with a touch of horse mane. Instead she was an under-appreciated freelance journalist and waitress in New York City, frustrated at always being broke and completely miserable in love. When she tastes her first pétillant-naturel (pét-nat for short), a type of natural wine made with no additives or chemicals, it sets her on a journey of self-discovery, both deeply personal and professional, that leads her to Paris, Italy, Spain, Georgia, and finally deep into the wilds of South Australia and which forces her, in the face of her "Wildman," to ask herself the hard question: can she really handle the unconventional life she claims she wants? Have you ever been sidetracked by something that turned into a career path? Did you ever think you were looking for a certain kind of romantic partner, but fell in love with someone wild, passionate and with a completely different life? For Signer, the discovery of natural wine became an introduction to a larger ethos and philosophy that she had long craved: one rooted in egalitarianism, diversity, organics, environmental concerns, and ancient traditions. In You Had Me at Pét-Nat, as Signer begins to truly understand these revolutionary wine producers upending the industry, their deep commitment to making their wine with integrity and with as little intervention as possible, she is smacked with the realization that unless she faces, head-on, her own issues with commitment, she will not be able to live a life that is as freewheeling, unpredictable, and singular as the wine she loves.

First Vintage explores the forgotten history of the early Australian wine industry. Few people know that vine cuttings were brought to Australia on the First Fleet and planted in Governor Arthur Phillip’s garden at Circular Quay, or that botanist and champion of colonial development Joseph Banks encouraged plans to create a wine industry from the earliest years of the colony. Before the assisted migration of German vinedressers in the 1830s, any convict or free settler with a hint of vine growing or wine making expertise was quickly drafted to the cause. First Vintage reveals the people who dreamed of making Australia a wine-drinking country, including influential colonists Blaxland, Wentworth and Lawson, Richard Windeyer, John Macarthur and Thomas Mitchell, who all had vineyards. It shows the challenges of choosing vine stock, the battles to protect against pests and diseases, and the innovation of new technologies which assisted small scale growers, many in wine regions which vanished from the landscape and memory for much of the twentieth century.