From Tuscany to the Thriller: A Conversation with Vintner and Debut Novelist Daniel Grace
📖 Get the book: In the Wake of Golgotha is available now on Amazon in hardcover and Kindle. Learn more at Daniel's Website and follow along at @danielmarkgrace on Instagram.
🍷 Find the wine: Il Molino di Grace ships direct and is available in fine wine shops across 42 states. Visit ilmolinograce.it.
🍾 Join our Inner Circle: My wines, Sollevato Wines now has a wine club — Il Circolo — and the 2023 Sangiovese is out now. Learn more and become a member here.
Some conversations on Sip With Nikki are about wine. Some are about life. And every once in a while, one arrives that manages to be about both at thee same time — in the most unexpected, delightful way.
This week's guest is Daniel Grace: California-born, London-raised, Tuscany-rooted winemaker, former advertising executive, theater performer, father of three, and — as of March 2026 — debut novelist. If that sounds like a lot, it is. And that's exactly what makes him one of the most fascinating people to land in Nikki's chair.
From San Francisco to Panzano: A Family's Leap of Faith
The Grace family's story in Tuscany begins in 1996, when Daniel's father made what Daniel calls an act of "incredible good fortune" — purchasing a historic property in Panzano, a village in the heart of the Chianti Classico zone, located almost exactly equidistant between Florence and Siena.
The land they acquired is nothing short of extraordinary. An ancient Etruscan road — over 2,000 years old — bisects the vineyards. The vines themselves were first planted in the 1500s by Franciscan monks, and a villa on the property once served as a Franciscan monastery. A 60-foot statue of San Francesco still stands at the top of the hill, honoring both the property's spiritual roots and the family's San Francisco heritage.
What did this California family do first when they took ownership of such storied land? They ripped out the Cabernet Sauvignon.
"We were purists," Daniel explains with a laugh. "We didn't want to be tempted to scratch that itch." Authenticity became their compass from day one — a philosophy that has guided every decision at Il Molino di Grace across 27 harvests.
The Wine: Solo Sangiovese Chianti Classico
For the episode's Sip Spotlight, both Nikki and Daniel poured the 2022 Il Molino di Grace Chianti Classico — a 100% Sangiovese that Daniel describes as a "farm in a bottle." While some producers consider that phrase an insult, for Daniel it's the highest compliment he can imagine.
The 2022 vintage is fruit-forward and expressive, with what Daniel calls a "bright, bold, balanced, beautiful" profile — vibrant red cherry fruit and youthful energy, sourced from vines under 12 years old. He calls these the vines with "youthful momentum," before the estate climbs into its Reserva, Gran Selezzione, and Super Tuscan tiers.
Daniel is passionate about the broader evolution of the Chianti Classico category, which he argues has undergone a genuine renaissance. Where the region once produced what he describes (diplomatically) as "lazy, flabby wines," today's Classicos are leaner, more expressive, and more honest — less oak, less blending, more pure terroir.
"There's a swagger and a sexiness to Chianti Classico that hasn't existed since the Medici days," he says.
Nikki — who makes her own 100% Sangiovese in Sonoma County under the Sollevato Wines label — couldn't agree more. The two share a love for this grape that is, as she puts it, still wildly underappreciated among American wine drinkers.
Il Molino di Grace is available in 42 states and ships direct. Find them at ilmolinograce.it.
The Book: In the Wake of Golgotha
Here's where the conversation takes a fascinating turn.
While standing in those ancient vineyards, surrounded by 2,000 years of living history, Daniel began to think about what else was happening in the world two millennia ago. Specifically, a single event on a hill, on a faraway land — an event whose collateral damage, he felt, had never been fully explored.
In the Wake of Golgotha, Daniel's debut novel released on March 3, 2026, is a philosophical fantasy and literary thriller centered on two of history's most infamous yet least-examined figures: Judas Iscariot and Pontius Pilate. Rather than the one-dimensional villains of religious iconography, Daniel was fascinated by the vast blank canvas that exists around their true motivations, inner lives, and fates.
The story unfolds in contemporary New York City, following these two eternally damned souls as they navigate guilt, addiction, violence, and the possibility of redemption in the modern world. It's part theological meditation, part crime fiction, part philosophical exploration of what it means to carry the weight of a decision that changed history.
"We all carry freight," Daniel says. "And despite the fact these are two of history's most cursed characters, that baggage is universal. It's about all of us."
The book is not, he is careful to note, a Christian or Catholic novel — it's a human one. Themes of capital punishment, the nature of judgment, betrayal, and the possibility of grace (no pun intended) transcend any single religious tradition.
What Wine Is Your Book?
In what Daniel calls the best question anyone has asked him on the entire book tour, Nikki posed a curveball: If your book were a wine, what would it be?
He paused. He thought. And then he landed on an answer he says he'll use forever.
Etna wines — specifically from Sicily's still-erupting Mount Etna, perhaps a Nerello Mascalese or even a Zibibbo. Why? Because just as In the Wake of Golgotha takes everything you thought you knew and flips it on its head, Etna wines shatter every assumption about what a wine should taste like. The volcanic minerality, the tension, the friction, the absolute surprise — it mirrors the intent of the book perfectly.
"There's two sides to every soul, just as there's two sides to every story," Daniel reflects. "And the same is true with terroir and fruit."
On Being More Than One Thing
Perhaps the deepest thread running through this conversation is one that Nikki knows intimately: the courage — and the joy — of being a multi-passionate person in a world that tends to want you to pick a lane.
Daniel spent years in advertising. Then he jumped into winemaking with his family. Now, at 55, he's on his first book tour, doing live radio breakfast shows in Wisconsin, sweating through every podcast and bookstore appearance, feeling like a complete fish out of water.
And he loves every second of it.
"I'm forever grateful for just being so rejuvenated by being so nervous," he says. "It's like a polar plunge into freezing cold water."
Nikki — who made her own leap from Disney and the corporate world into winemaking and podcasting — sees her own story reflected back. She puts it plainly: "It's in those moments where we want to vomit, when we're sweaty, when we are most uncomfortable, that we grow the most."
You don't have to be just one thing. And this episode is a joyful, generous reminder of exactly that.