Book Excerpt: Vintage Crime – A Short History of Wine Fraud

BY REBECCA GIBB MW | OCTOBER 11, 2023

In her new book Vintage Crime – A Short History of Wine Fraud, Rebecca Gibb MW tells the history of wine through some of the most well-known cases of fraud, in addition to less well-documented incidents that intrigued Rebecca personally.

Having passed the notorious Master of Wine tasting exams in 2012, there was just the dissertation to complete before acquiring the elusive MW letters. But one proposal after another was rejected. In need of inspiration, Don and Petie Kladstrup’s Champagne book How the World's Most Glamorous Wine Triumphed Over War and Hard Times came to the rescue. If you have not read it, the book is a colorful wine history and includes a snappy chapter on the 1911 Champagne riots. It seemed like a juicier topic than a Beaujolais, and it emerged that there was a scarcity of information about it, particularly in English.

Three years, a hefty mortgage and one sizeable baby later, Rebecca had also become an expert on the reasons behind the Champagne riots and the world’s 384th Master of Wine. Fraud was one of the major causes of the protests, and it stirred an interest in the dark side of the wine world that has culminated in this book.