Product Description

Here's something no wine aficionado should be without. The experts at Wine Spectator magazine have tasted tens of thousands of wines to provide oenophiles with a complete reference of exceptional wines from around the world. Because it guides its readers to only the most satisfying selections, the Wine Spectator, one of the foremost publications on the subject of wine, is valued for the select reviews that appear in each issue. This comprehensive buying guide includes more than 10,000 listings, representing all recent vintages from 40 countries, organized by both wine and country of origin. Each entry includes a full review and rating. Make no mistake--these are the most interesting wines available, all rated on Wine Spectator's unique 100-point scale. This is the only volume that gathers all the results of the magazine staff's most current tastings into one convenient resource, and along with our other successful Wine Spectator titles, it's sure to be a strong addition to our successful wine and spirits category.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1083146 in Books
• Published on: 2004-11-26
• Format: Bargain Price
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 1004 pages

Amazon.com Review
No more excuses for buying wine based on label design! The popular Wine Spectator magazine's massive guide covers common recent vintages as well as rare collectibles. More than 40,000 individual wine ratings--organized first by country, then by producer--are based on blind tastings by the magazine's editors. Each entry includes a rating on a 100-point scale, price information, and often a description of the wine--for example, "Wild and exotic, bursting at the seams with tons of round fruit flavors, loads of wild berry characteristics, hints of violets, earth and blueberries and well-integrated tannins to boot." The editors smartly contextualize this mass of data with an introduction to each country's wine industry, emphasizing the country's major growing regions, common grape varietals, significant geographic and climatic influences, labeling conventions, and stylistic traditions and trends.

This guide's most useful features are tables organizing the wines by overall quality or value. For example, the connoisseur will enjoy the table listing only the finest wines from the greatest vintages of the past 10 years. Any wine enthusiast will do well with the table featuring "value wines" rated 85 points or higher but costing less than $12. Another table of top-rated current releases is a veritable shopping list. With that list, no one needs to rely on pretty labels anymore. --Brendan Finucane

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Customer Reviews

An Authoritative Guide
Editor and Publisher Marvin R. Shanken calls this book "an indispensable resource" for wine lovers. I'd have to say he is right about that. This book provides everything and then some that most of the wine buying public needs or wants to know about the vintner's tasty product. Over 40,000 wines are reviewed and there are tasting notes on more than 20,000.

One section of the book concentrates on great wines suitable for the wine collector. It rates the best wines from the present vintages of what the authors consider are the world's most prestigious wine types. These are identified as Red Bordeaux, Red Burgundy, White Burgundy, Red Rhome, Piedmont Red, Tuscan Red, Vintage Port, and California Cabernet. Included with the ratings are date references to "Wine Spectator" issues in which the wines were rated.

Another interesting feature is a wine buying strategy for stocking wine cellars. Vintage charts are provided which cover the top 100 best wines released by year from 1988 to 1999. A detachable and foldable vintage chart is included which may be carried in the purse or wallet for easy reference during those shopping sprees. Also helpful is a complete winery index at the back of the book.

For those folks like me who are not wine aficionados but like to get the best value for their dollars, the editors have included a checklist for wineries and wines of good quality for $12.00 or less. This is a fairly inclusive list and includes wines from Argentina, Australia, Chile, France, Italy, Spain, and the United States.

Full of great information, there is probably too much detail for the casual wine shopper; however, it appears to be a must have for the more discriminating wine buyer.

Don't waste your money on 8th edition
I had great hopes for the 8th edition as I have used previous editions a lot. What a letdown this new edition is. A total diversion from previous editions, it only list one vintage year (the most recent one) for each wine!!! This book is a compiled list of all wines reviewed by the Wine Spectator in the last year ONLY. If that is of interest to you, go right ahead, spend your money and be happy. I would rather try to obtain an older edition if you want a reference to use as comparisons. Or/and by Parker's Wine buying guide which is far, far superior.

This book is abysmal
In 2000, WS published their 7th edition of the Ultimate wine buying guide. This books was too early to rate and address most of the Year 2000 Bordeaux vintage (as well as other year 2000 varietals). So one would expect that the 8th edition (published in 2004) would cover the 2000 Bordeaux wines, particularly since this vintage is widely-lauded as one of the best vintages in the last few decades. But no. The "Ultimate Guide" largely does not cover one of the best vintages of arguably the most prestigious varietal produced. This is beyond absurd.

Also this book eliminates 30,000 wines which were covered in the 7th edition. It also eliminates the relatively in-depth discussion of different wine-growing regions. It eliminates yearly summary vintage ratings. It has no index.

One can only presume that WS wants to publish one of these every year or two and make wine enthusiasts have to purchase each edition now, as apparently each edition will only address a limited number of wines.

This awful book is simply awful. Whoever made the above-referenced changes was severely misguided.