On Italy and Bulldozers by Alexander McCall Smith    My Italian Bulldozer  was written as a result of a long love affair - not with a person, but with a country. Italy is one of those places that engages the affections of just about everybody who ever goes there. It is possible, I suppose, that there are some visitors to that beguiling country who find that it does not suit them for one reason or another - but they must be few and far between. For most of us, Italy is a country with which we rapidly and completely fall in love.   I first went to the small hill town of Montalcino when I spent a brief period in Siena as a student. In those days Montalcino was very quiet: although it had its visitors, it was well off the established track: Siena and Florence were not far away, and there were also any number of well-established nearby magnets for those making an artistic pilgrimage to this most beautiful of Italian regions. And so it was to a rather sleepy Montalcino that I made my way in a toiling old blue bus all those years ago.   Nothing much was happening. This was about the time that the famous Montalcino wine,  Brunello di Montalcino , was being more widely discovered, but the full impact of this famous product was yet to be felt. There was only one hotel in the town and even on a market day the small piazzas and narrow streets of the town were hardly thronged with people. When I returned a few years later, it was still quiet, although word of Montalcino's charms was then  beginning to spread further afield.   Today Montalcino is a well-known stop on any wine tour of Italy. This fame, though, has by no means spoilt the town, which is still every bit as charming as it always was. The strong civic sense that it enjoys - a quality that Italian towns for the most part hold on to in the face of every change - is still there, as is a remarkable friendliness and tranquility. The people of Montalcino are aware of the fact that they live in a picture-book place, but that does not stop ordinary life being carried on unselfconsciously. And, as is often the case in Italy, visitors are treated as part of this pageant of daily life - everybody has his or her role.   In writing  My Italian Bulldozer  I wanted to say something about this gem of a town and share the affection I have for it. I also wanted to write about two of Italy's great gifts to the rest of us: her wines and her cuisine. The pleasures of the Italian table hardly need any advocacy from novelists, but who can resist sharing the things they really enjoy? I wrote this book immediately after my most recent trip to Montalcino. The sound of the cicadas in the woods was still in my ears; the smell of dust and olive trees and all the other things that make up the Italian countryside was still with me; the memory of a fine glass of Brunello, sampled with a group of dear Italian friends on a hot July day, was still on my palate. I felt grateful for all that, and it is gratitude, I think, that lies behind this strange story of a bulldozer and the unexpected adventure it brought.   Alexander McCall Smith Excerpted from My Italian Bulldozer by Alexander Mccall Smith All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.