Editorial Reviews 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.