Well folks it finally happened. I have found a perfect excuse to blog about TWO of my passions.  Most people who know me have long realized that I really appreciate a nice glass of red.  This summer I had a friend visit who brought me a bottle with a cool name.  She said she bought it because the name reminded her of the books I read. LOL.  However, the real bonus was that it was full-bodied and DELICIOUS!

An Australian red blend called “19 Crimes” The Banished. Although the inside of the bottle contains a very delicious wine, the outside of the bottle tells the story of James Wilson.

Because I loved “The Banished“, I splurged and bought another variety of “19 Crimes” namely the cabernet sauvignon.  Both bottles are highly recommended by me.

I took a photo of my two bottles of “19 Crimes” with just a few of my crime fiction anthologies.  Some I’ve had for many, many years.  One of them, which I bought at a thrift store is so old that it doesn’t have an ISBN.  It is the 1929 hardcover edition of “The Omnibus of Crime” edited by the infamous Dorothy L. Sayers which contains over fifty selections made by Dorothy Sayers, scholar and detective-story writer. (pictured between the wine bottles)

Some of the other anthologies in the photo are:

9780143053491  “The Penguin Book of Crime Stories” compiled by Peter Robinson

9780762437252 “The Mammoth Book of the World’s Best Crime stories” edited by Maxim Jakubowski

9780195182149  “A New Omnibus of Crime” edited by Tony Hillerman, Rosemary Herbert, Sue Grafton, and Jeffrey Deaver

9780786707386  “Crème de la Crime” edited by Janet Hutchings

9781555213503 “Ellery Queen’s Prime Crimes” by Ellery Queen

Just like “judging a book by its cover” doesn’t always have happy results, judging a wine by it’s label can sometimes disappoint.  This time however, I was pleasantly surprised.  Another time I chose a wine by it’s label was in the case of a “Mr. Black’s Little Book“, which turned out to be a very pleasant shiraz.   (I mean really… how could I NOT buy a wine with the word book in the name?) As with all wines though, the vintage can change the taste drastically.

And no… this doesn’t mean I’ll be doing more posts about wine.  This was a ‘one off’.

Do YOU have any favourite wines?  I’d love to hear your recommendations.