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Wine Grapes: A Complete Guide to 1,368 Vine Varieties, Including Their Origins and Flavours [Hardcover]

Jancis Robinson , Julia Harding , Jose Vouillamoz
4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (40 customer reviews)

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Book Description

November 6, 2012
Wine enthusiasts everywhere rejoice! Wine Grapes provides absolutely everything the connoisseur wants to know about the succulent, remarkable fruit that care, love, skill, and time transform into humankind’s most beloved beverage—and presents it all in a stunningly beautiful, gorgeously illustrated package. The dazzling co-creation of Jancis Robinson, one of the world’s best known wine authorities, Julia Harding, who passed the Master of Wine exams at the top of her class, and internationally renowned botanist José Vouillamoz, Wine Grapes is the first complete compendium in more than a century to all grape varieties relevant to the wine lover. An exquisite gift book—and a must-own for anyone in the food and wine industry—Wine Grapes charts the relationships of the grapes (with some astounding family trees), discusses in fascinating detail where and how they are grown, and, most importantly, what the wines made from them will ultimately taste like.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

A fantastic Christmas present for any wine geek, and one that will provide an endless source of fiendish questions for quiz-setters (The Guardian )

‘A magnificent achievement: colossally informative, illuminating and intriguing (Decanter.com )

This book is a thing of beauty - classic, well written and splendidly illustrated - and will be a point of reference for decades to come. (Bordeaux Undiscovered )

“The most important wine book in years. (Tom Wark, Fermentation )

From the Back Cover

An indispensable book for every wine lover, from some of the world's leading wine experts.

Where do wine grapes come from and how are grape varieties related to one another? What is the historical background of each one? Where are they grown? What sort of wines do they make?

Using cutting-edge DNA analysis and detailing almost 1,400 distinct grape varieties, as well as myriad correct (and incorrect) synonyms, this book examines grapes and wine as never before. Here is a complete, alphabetically presented profile of all grape varieties of relevance to the wine lover, charting the relationships between them and including unique and astounding family trees, their characteristics in the vineyard, and—most important—what the wines made from them taste like.

Presented in a stunning design with eight-page gatefolds that reveal the family trees, and a rich variety of full-color illustrations from Viala and Vermorel's century-old classic ampelography, the text will deepen readers' understanding of grapes and wine with every page. Combining Jancis Robinson's worldview and nose for good writing and good wines with Julia Harding's research, expertise, and attention to detail plus Dr. Vouillamoz's unique level of scholarship, Wine Grapes offers essential and original information in greater depth and breadth than has ever been available before. This is a book for wine students, wine experts, and wine lovers everywhere.


Product Details

  • Hardcover: 1280 pages
  • Publisher: Ecco (November 6, 2012)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0062206362
  • ISBN-13: 978-0062206367
  • Product Dimensions: 11.4 x 7.4 x 3.2 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 6.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (40 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #13,352 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

One of a handful of wine communicators with an international reputation, Jancis Robinson writes daily for JancisRobinson.com (voted first-ever Wine Website of the Year in the Louis Roederer International Wine Writers Awards 2010), weekly for The Financial Times, and bi-monthly for a column that is syndicated around the world. She is also editor of The Oxford Companion to Wine, co-author with Hugh Johnson of The World Atlas of Wine, co-author of Wine Grapes - A complete guide to 1,368 vine varieties, including their origins and flavours, each of these books recognized as a standard reference worldwide.

An award-winning TV presenter, she is invited all over the world to conduct wine events and act as a wine judge. In 1984 she was the first person outside the wine trade to pass the rigorous Master of Wine exams and in 2003 she was awarded an OBE by Her Majesty the Queen, on whose cellar she now advises.

She loves and lives for wine in all its glorious diversity, generally favouring balance and subtlety over sheer mass.

Customer Reviews

4.8 out of 5 stars
(40)
4.8 out of 5 stars
It is entertaining and easy to read. BRUNO PRATS  |  5 reviewers made a similar statement
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
36 of 37 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars A Great Work BUT! November 22, 2012
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
This is a fantastic piece of work by Jancis and her team, long awaited by me here in Hong Kong. I went for buying through the US amazon website. Here is the big BUT. Terrible printing and publishing. For a book of this price USD 120 by the time it got to me, the quality of the production of the book leaves a lot to be desired. Print is difficult to read due to poor black and white contrast. For anybody with eyesight issues I strongly advise you do not buy it. Many org charts (now available to download in Purple Pages website - thank you Jancis) are hidden the the spine of the book and hence not legible. What a shame. Hopefully the UK published version is better. As a book of reference I think it will go down in history as definitive but I would wait in the hope the publishers get their act together for future print runs. I would have given this 5 stars but ......
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27 of 29 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Magnificent but imperfect November 21, 2012
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
For years I've loved Jancis Robinson's pocket-sized Guide to Wine Grapes, turning to it whenever I encounter a new wine grape. Alas, it is long out of print, and a bit dated in terms of the relationships between grapes.

Now comes this new volume, which is anything but pocket-sized. Massive and slip-cased, it has the gravitas of an aged Premier Cru. For each of nearly 1400 varieties there is an entry that gives you its color (from among five choices), common synonyms (for some widely grown grapes there are many), other varieties it is often mistaken for, and what is known of its origins and heritage (relying on recent, extensive, DNA testing of wine grapes). Then there is a brief summary of how it grows (vigor, resistance, when it ripens, and the like) and where it grows. As warranted, there is a discussion of what it tastes like and the quality of the wine it produces. Many of these grapes are actually very marginal from a wine making viewpoint, and are of interest for historical or relationship reasons. (I do miss the little sliding bar from the earlier book that suggested at a glance the likelihood of the grape producing a decent wine.)

The relationship information is fascinating. Selected grapes have a family tree associated with their entry. Looking at Cabernet Sauvignon we learn that Chenin Blanc is a sister of Sauvignon Blanc and, hence, an aunt of Cabernet Sauvignon. Freisa turns out to be a cross of Nebbiolo with an unknown grape. The foldout genealogy of Pinot Noir is remarkable. Who would have guessed that Lagrein is a granddaughter of Pinot, while Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah are both great granddaughters? On a down side, the figure is sewn so deeply into the binding that part of the tree can't be read.

I decided to check on a grape of local (but not wine drinking!) interest. In the earlier book there is an entry for the Mission grape, the first wine grape brought to California; there is was associated with the Monica grape. The current volume doesn't have an entry for Mission (it has entries pointing you to a main entry for some synonyms, but not for others). Checking the index it turns out that Mission is actually Listan Prieto. (Which I'd certainly never heard of before.)

There are also beautiful color plates, originally published in France over a century ago, of selected grapes. (Interestingly, one is labeled "Mission"!)

But there are, alas, some imperfections. I've mentioned how the Pinot family tree is bound so that it is not all readable. While the paper in a volume this size is necessarily thin, the see-through on some pages is annoying; more opaque paper would have been nice. The label on the front of the slip case is somewhat crooked, and the one on the edge quite so. Production quality could have been better.

Had this been a standard book at half or even two-thirds the price it would have been an easy five stars. But in a slip-cased book at this list price you expect a little better attention to detail than this book manages. So I reluctantly drop my rating to four stars. Still an excellent investment for or gift to a devoted oenophile, it is not quite the value it could have been with a little better physical execution.
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars The book I have been waiting for January 2, 2013
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
I have been professionally involved in wine production for nearly 30 years. For many of those years I have been hoping that Jancis Robinson would update her old classic, "Vines Grapes and Wines". "Wine Grapes" is much more than a revision of the old book; it is a definitive volume that brings us up to date on what is known of the parentage and characteristics of essentially all of the commercially important, and many of the more obscure, wine grapes. It is beautifully produced in hard cover, well organized and well documented. Wine retailers, wholesalers, importers, producers, wine educators and grape growers will all want this volume at hand. Serious wine enthusiasts will also find it fascinating to research whatever grape variety has recently piqued their interest. Most highly recommended!
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars This is the ultimate enciclopedia of wine!
Unbeliavable book! Never have I seen such a research on wine. The research made to write this book is worthy of a Nobel Prize. Read more
Published 10 days ago by JOAO L.
5.0 out of 5 stars The new wine bible
This book is truly a complete guide of the world varieties. It has wonderfully easy to understand details that range from grape color to synonyms in other countries, a pinot family... Read more
Published 27 days ago by sue slater
5.0 out of 5 stars Definitive Volume on Wine Grapes
I purchased this book as a birthday present for a friend, who is a wine expert. Hie loves the books and finds it most useful.
Published 1 month ago by George Webster, Ph.D.,
5.0 out of 5 stars GRAPES
I HAVE NOT READ VERY MUCH YET
BUT WHAT I Have read is very good i wiil tell you more when i read it
Published 1 month ago by martha a wine lover
5.0 out of 5 stars For wine-for-life students
I have had fun with this technical manual for grapes. It has the detail and depth I want in the more scientific world of grape knowledge.
Published 1 month ago by Neil Engelbrecht
4.0 out of 5 stars God damn right 4 stars
It wasn't a half bad purchase...I'd do it again. Sweet binder it came in made me cry with joy and stuff....
Published 2 months ago by Adam C. Vignola
5.0 out of 5 stars Gerar book
Every Wine Lover should have this book.
It's not. a regular reading book.
It's a book to do reserch when you open a bottle.
Keep it near your cellar and have fun.
Published 2 months ago by Abilio Cardoso
5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful gift for a wine lover.
This book was requested by a son who is a thousand times as knowledgeable as his parents, and he loved it..
Published 2 months ago by M. Cooper
5.0 out of 5 stars What a find!
Beautiful book clearly put together with a lot of love. Artful, well-researched & thoroughly professional. I bought it as a gift. He LOVES it.
Published 2 months ago by Anita Sulaiman
5.0 out of 5 stars Great book
This book is great for people like me who study wine grapes. There are better books for studying wine, but that is not the purpose of this book. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Matthew Wentz
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