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Books about wine can be like books about sex. They're a poor surrogate for the real thing. Keep this in mind as you agonize over whether to lay down $50 on a coffee-table encyclopedia, the kind with schematic diagrams of bladder presses and treatises on malolactic fermentation.

That same fifty bucks can buy a bottle or two of decent Côtes du Rhône.

But there are times when printed words can make a reasonable alternative to the real thing, such as in jurisdictions where it would be illegal to procure the latter (provinces where the drinking age is 19, and you're only 18, say).

Each year sees a new spate of volumes added to the pile. If I were to rate this year's book crop like a grape harvest, I'd say it's a lesser vintage. Memoirs have been particularly bountiful, notably by American importers such as Sergio Esposito (Passion on the Vine) and Neal Rosenthal (Reflections of a Wine Merchant). None, however, comes close to the archetype of the genre, Adventures on the Wine Route by Kermit Lynch. Still in print after 20 years, it proved the California-hippie-turned-wine-importer is at least as good at writing as at unearthing gems from the French countryside.

Narrative is that essence so often absent in wine books, sadly. Publishers have a tendency to award book deals to people who are better trained at drinking than at writing.

And so the best wine book of the year by far is The Billionaire's Vinegar by U.S. magazine journalist Benjamin Wallace (Crown Publishers, $27.95). Brilliantly paced, this real-life mystery tale centres on a 1787 bottle of Château Lafite that supposedly belonged to Thomas Jefferson. The bottle, which may not even be a Lafite, ends up as Exhibit A in a counterfeiting scandal that continues to unravel today. Buzz Bissinger, the Pulitzer-winning journalist, calls the cast in this whodunit "like something out of Fawlty Towers meets The Departed."

A Hollywood movie is in the works, of course.

Lacking in narrative but making up for it with scholarship is Bordeaux/Burgundy: A Vintage Rivalry by Jean-Robert Pitte (University of California Press, $33.50). Mr. Pitte is a former president of the Sorbonne in Paris as well as a professor of geography, and he peppers this slim volume with plenty of distracting footnotes. At times he also appears, like no end of wine snobs, to take his subject too seriously. In one homily he actually suggests Europe could assert itself more effectively as a global power by boasting about its wines. "The diversity that its wines magnificently express, through a mosaic of terroirs, is an insuperable advantage in this regard," he writes. A sort of multicultural manifesto based on grapes. Weird.

But for eggheads who love to argue over which of the title's two solitudes makes the better juice - the "Jackie or Marilyn" question of wine, I suppose - this conciliatory polemic may provide some satisfying bedtime reading.

For literary sorts, the surprise entry this year is Everyday Drinking: The Distilled Kingsley Amis (Bloomsbury, $21.99). I say surprise because Sir Kingsley passed away in 1995. There's not much in the way of cutting-edge wisdom or timely advice in this compilation, to be sure. "The dry white wines of Burgundy are very good value," he writes, in a clearly dated passage. "Go for Pouilly-Fuissé, which can be drunk young at something under £1. Chablis, Meursault, Puligny-Montrachet will cost you a little more." It would be hard to find a Meursault for under £20 (about $40) today. But the book entertainingly underscores the notion that how you drink is as important as what you drink.

The extended quiz section that runs to almost 100 pages also would make for a better parlour game than the home version of Deal or No Deal. And there are plenty of bons mots to memorize and trot out at holiday parties, such as the author's screed against beer with lime: "An exit application from the human race."

Pocket guides implicitly intended as in-store shopping guides are, for the most part, next to useless, in my experience. Typically written by Britons and, increasingly, Americans, these books tend to have little relevance in the Canadian market.

One happy exception is the exceedingly useful Billy's Best Bottles (McArthur & Co., $19.95), a trim paperback now in its 19th year. Many writers and public speakers will lay claim to being paragons of anti-snobbery, but no one shows pretense the door like Toronto-based Billy Munnelly. He categorizes wines by mood, such as "rustic red" and "fresh white," and writes in a trademark breezy style.

"Devoid of a single pronounced grape character, it's a step back to when wine tasted like wine!" he writes of La Vieille Ferme white, a highly underrated wine from southern France. "Forget your favourite for a week and buy the Old Farm. Could be the best house white in the world."

Best of all, most of the wines in this guide, though taken from the permanent-inventory listings in Ontario, are widely available across the country and cost less than the book.

Would that I could say the same of Parker's Wine Buyer's Guide No. 7 (Simon & Schuster, $39.99 for the soft cover). This latest edition of the most important wine guide on the planet is very useful to connoisseurs.

Mr. Parker's reviews and 100-point scoring system are gospel. This volume is essentially a reprint of the past several years of his influential newsletter The Wine Advocate. It's a tidy and portable - if heavy at 1,500-plus pages - reference to toss in the back seat of the Bentley on your way to a wine auction.

Less "infallible" but more fun is the illustrated hardcover 1001 Wines You Must Taste Before You Die (Universe, $39.95). Edited by British critic Neil Beckett, this hefty field guide is based on the opinions of 44 "leading international critics." I love the range here, both geographic and pecuniary. There's Pétrus and Château Rayas, of course, but it also serves up insider gems, such as Herdade do Esporao Reserva from Portugal and Feudi di San Gregorio Fiano di Avellino (which sell for less than $30 in Canada). There's a corresponding volume on comestibles titled 1001 Foods You Must Taste Before You Die. Me, I'm hoping there will be a third volume, on sex positions.