Wine Festivals, Long Time Gone, and Me

My fourth Konigsburg book, Long Time Gone, releases next Tuesday (contests and prizes will be forthcoming). It's Erik Toleffson's story, but it's also Morgan Barrett's story. Morgan is manager of a winery outside Konigsburg. As I've explained elsewhere, Texas is a big wine-producing state, and the Hill Country is one of the major wine regions. Long Time Gone closes with a wine festival, which is actually pretty typical. Texas is full of wine festivals year-round, but the festival in Long Time Gone may remind Texas wine drinkers of one in particular: the Fredericksburg Food and Wine Fest. Fredericksburg, for those who aren't familiar with the area, is pretty much Hill Country Central. It's an old town, dating back to the mid-nineteenth century and founded by German immigrants. Although wine production has spread throughout Texas at this point, there are still a bumper crop of vineyards and wineries in the Fredericksburg area, as well as some famous peach orchards.

Every fall Fredericksburg holds its wine festival, usually in October. Those in northern climes (like me) might consider that a bit risky—I mean we had a couple of feet of snow here on the Front Range last October. But in South Texas, October is the month when things finally begin to cool down a little. Which means that the Fredericksburg festival is a lot more comfortable than the Austin festival in May or the famous Grapevine festival in September, both of which tend to be blistering.

The Food and Wine Fest is held in the Fredericksburg city park, which also is well set up for festivals and arts and crafts shows. Here's how I described the wine pavilion in Long Time Gone:

Around noon, Erik took a quick tour around the perimeter of the city park. All three pavilions were in use. The largest had the winery booths. The varicolored silk banners dangled over each one, with the winery's name and logo. Across the front of the building was a table with the silent auction baskets full of wine bottles and gift-wrapped boxes with floppy ribbons. Hostesses from the Konigsburg Merchants Association milled around, dressed in cowboy hats and vests that made them look like waitresses in a kiddy restaurant.

That is, I assure you, what the winery pavilion looks like in Fredericksburg, too. The other thing I stole from the Food and Wine Fest is the music. Bands play in their own small pavilion with an eclectic variety of musicians. The DH and I even caught the amazing Joel Guzman, accordionist extraordinaire, playing electric organ for one group.

However, for the several years we attended, the headliner was always the same: the legendary Ponty Bone and his band. Ponty played with the Texas Tornadoes among others, and his brand of music combines Tejano and Cajun in a kind of seamless blend.

I also borrowed the idea of the "dance leader" from reality. I have no idea who this guy was, but he always led the line dances whenever Ponty got going, and he could be pretty nasty to anyone who didn't get up and follow him, particularly non-dancing people like me who wanted to take his picture. Never mind. I revenged myself by making him an eighty-year-old banker in a Hawaiian shirt in Long Time Gone. So there.

So anyway, thank you Fredericksburg for providing me with so much material. And thank you all for reading my Konigsburg books. Long Time Gone will be available from Samhain Publishing starting July 6.

And now, a bonus. All who comment here will be entered in a drawing for a free copy of Long Time Gone when it releases on Tuesday. Let the comments begin!