New Zealand literature's preoccupation with vineyards continues. Catherine Chidgey's third novel, Transformation, will be launched at Clearview Estate Winery in Hawkes Bay, on Thursday 6 November. The novel is set in the 1890s, when a wig-maker called Dubois flees Paris to escape his past. He settles in Tampa, Florida, and adopts a new identity to avoid being traced. The publisher, Victoria University Press, is hailing Transformation as "the most eagerly awaited New Zealand novel of 2003 ... an extraordinary historical adventure and mystery." Tickets to the Clearview launch are $12 and available from Napier booksellers Beattie & Forbes, on (06) 835 8968. Wine, no doubt, will be available.