Starling on the Ebro: A Children’s Book Set Among Rioja Vineyards Wins 2009 Gourmand Prize
Thursday, July 23rd, 2009
A bilingual (Spanish/English) children’s book published by the Fundación Dinastía Vivanco, about a wounded starling who spends a year convalescing in a Rioja vineyard, has won a Gourmand World Cookbook Award for Best Illustrated Wine Book.
El Estornino Saturnino en La Tierra de Vino (The Gloomy Starling in Wine Country), by Judith Sáenz de Tejada, “charts a year in a vineyard through the eyes of a wounded starling rescued and adopted by a winemaker in Rioja,” reports Oliver Styles in an item that appeared today on Decanter.com.*
A kids’ book about viticulture might strike a few American readers as a bit incongruous at first, but upon closer inspection, the book is clearly a labor of love, with universal lessons to teach and a lovely, higher purpose in mind.
“In my opinion,” the author says, “that cocktail of wine and culture is all part of the same view of life: love for our past, for the earth and for people.”
Bravo to Ms. Sáenz de Tejada and to the Fundación Dinastía Vivanco.
*I was first alerted to the prize—and indeed, to the book itself—by way of WineTravel.com founder Wink Lorch’s Twitter account.
Click here to see a short video clip about the book by Thirst for Rioja blogger Robert McIntosh.
AUTHOR”S NOTE: As far as I know, this book is not available for sale in the U.S. As soon as I find out how to get a copy, I will let my readers know.
