Field Blends
A novel by Andrew Welch
Available from major book sellers around the world, including:
“Field Blends is the modern reader’s guide on how to experience the world, with the reminder that we are all human, sharing a diverse planet.”
-Jill Barth, Wine and Travel Writer, Contributor to Forbes and USA Today
“We three laughed together and spoke of wine and politics and sex and love and Europe and America and the world turned upside down.”
-Excerpt from Field Blends
Back Cover
Field Blends is a story of the world as it is today, contemplation to the intersection of modernity, technology, culture, and the people, pasts, and communities that give each of us roots. In socially and civically trying times, Field Blends follows an odd group of twenty and thirty-somethings from around the world as they meander through Europe, dropping in and out of one another’s journeys, before returning to New York only to be faced with heartbreak that none of them expected.
Told through the eyes of those friends—and often seen through the lens of the wine they drink—in the tumult of love and self doubt, against the backdrop of an ever-changing world, Field Blends seeks reconciliation of life amongst the monuments, hideaways, and progressive thought of great American and European cities with memories of hometowns, mother countries, and family. It is both joyful of the world’s beauties and melancholy of its present failures.
Praise for Field Blends
“New author Andrew Welch has a passion for life, wine and nuanced ideas. Building on his extensive European travels, he spins a tale that explores the amorphous boundaries of identity, relationships, where we call home and political ideology. It is a story well-suited to our shifting contemporary world.”
Michael K. Powell
President & CEO of The Internet & Television Association
“I’ve always said that we are all a product of our environment. This book truly shows the strength and resilience of being raised in a God fearing, loving, compassionate environment that never leaves you. Congratulations on a book well done.”
Senator Joe Manchin
United States Senator from West Virginia
“Andrew takes readers with flying colours into a beautiful journey through the world, vineyards, wine bars, big cities and friendships. Field Blends is a book for every wine aficionado and world citizen. It gives matter to think about wines, society, our roots, friendship and more generally what is life. Like its author, this book is deeply human.”
Carole Bryon
Lady of the Grapes, Covent Garden, London
“Luminous, compelling and lyrical, Field Blends plumbs the angst of a generation’s search for meaning and purpose within a society that seems to be shifting from under their feet. Andrew Welch’s characters—complex, diverse and universally uncertain—come together and apart in a common quest to get beneath the surface of things, to find who they are meant to be and where they fit in an increasingly unrecognizable world. With its elegant style, vivid imagery and remarkable insights, Field Blends is as intoxicating and delicious as the wines that provide the narrative’s backdrop.”
Greg Fields
Author, Arc of the Comet
2018 Kindle Book of the Year Nominee in Literary Fiction
“Andrew Welch’s extraordinary imagination and energy were apparent during his undergraduate days at William & Mary. Now he has written a first novel, informed by his roots in a tiny town in a mountainous state, then by his delight in the liberal arts and sciences in college, and global travel thereafter. Field Blends is a richly drawn account of complex friendships evolving amid great wine and great cities, with a strong undercurrent of millennials seeking meaning in the troubled world in which they must make their way. This is a challenging, engaging story.”
W. Taylor Reveley, III
Former President of The College of William & Mary
“With a sparkling wit and a keen eye for details, Andrew is a born storyteller. He’s an observant world traveler with a wry affection for home. The debut of his first novel, Field Blends, is an exciting event.”
Katie Cristol
Member of the Arlington County Board, Virginia
“Neither the romantic passions of youth, nor the intoxicating glow of wine can keep darkness from the door.”
Jim Greenwood
U.S. Congressman from Pennsylvania from 1993 to 2005
“With his first book, Andrew Welch has invited us to a delightful and entertaining journey of characters traveling near and far. Sharing their discovery of interesting people and events is a delight. I found myself smiling with fond remembrances of my own similar journeys. Based on Field Blends we will be hearing much more from Andrew in the future.”
Dr. William Stubblefield
Rear Admiral (Retired)
"Field Blends is a tale of modern professionals in a contemporary and contentious environment. The crisp, wine enhanced dialogue adds a distinctive flavor to Welch's thought-provoking story. A really good read."
Richard Knott
Author, A Heritage of Wings
