Bianca Bosker

Harvard Book Store welcomes award-winning journalist and former executive tech editor of The Huffington Post BIANCA BOSKER for a discussion of her latest book, Cork Dork: A Wine-Fueled Adventure Among the Obsessive Sommeliers, Big Bottle Hunters, and Rogue Scientists Who Taught Me to Live for Taste.

About Cork Dork

Professional journalist and amateur drinker Bianca Bosker didn’t know much about wine—until she discovered an alternate universe where taste reigns supreme, a world of elite sommeliers who dedicate their lives to the pursuit of flavor. Astounded by their fervor and seemingly superhuman sensory powers, she set out to uncover what drove their obsession, and whether she, too, could become a "cork dork."

With boundless curiosity, humor, and a healthy dose of skepticism, Bosker takes the reader inside underground tasting groups, exclusive New York City restaurants, California mass-market wine factories, and even a neuroscientist’s fMRI machine as she attempts to answer the most nagging question of all: what’s the big deal about wine? What she learns will change the way you drink wine—and, perhaps, the way you live—forever.

Praise

"The Kitchen Confidential of wine: Read this book, and you’ll never be intimidated by wine—or wine snobs—again." —Madeline Puckette, co-author of Wine Folly 

"Bosker’s journey into this sodden universe is thrilling, and she tells her story with gonzo élan. . . . She gives great gossip . . . [and] is, in the main, great company as a narrator—witty, generous, democratic . . . When the sommelier and blogger Madeline Puckette writes that this book is the Kitchen Confidential of the wine world, she’s not wrong, though Bill Buford’s Heat is probably a shade closer to this book's sensibility and heart." —Jennifer Senior, The New York Times

"Cork Dork is a brilliant feat of screwball participatory journalism and Bianca Bosker is a gonzo nerd prodigy. This hilarious, thoughtful and erudite book may be the ultimate answer to the perennial question of whether or not wine connoisseurship is a scam." —Jay McInerney, author of The Juice