Miles is now a successful author, having written a novel called "Shameless" with much the same situations as the real-life Sideways.

[6] The novel recounts a road trip involving the three and a Filipina caretaker, Joy, as they head first to Oregon's Willamette Valley for the International Pinot Noir Celebration, and then to Sheboygan, Wisconsin, where Phyllis is to live with her sister, Alice.

[7]As the novel begins, Miles agrees to take his ailing mother, Phyllis, to live with her sister in Wisconsin.

He convinces Jack to tag along as wingman in return for some cash, hires a pot-smoking Filipina caretaker, Joy, to attend to his mother, and recovers Phyllis's beloved Yorkie, Snapper, from one of his ex-girlfriends.

They then set out on a trek that takes them up the California coastline and to Oregon wine country for a wild pinot noir festival.

The tensions come to a head in Oregon, where Joy abruptly quits after being falsely accused of stealing money from Phyllis.

The assisted suicide at the end, he said, "makes perfect sense; it's one of supreme compassion and renewed hope.

[8] Anticipating a sequel to the film Sideways, Pickett deliberately omitted the character Terra from Vertical.