Veseth, a wine writer and professor emeritus at the University of Puget Sound, has penned an informative work that will entertain any wine lover. Drawing inspiration from Jules Verne's classic novel, Veseth becomes a latter-day Phileas Fogg, bringing his reader on an adventure in wine history, grape cultivars, geography, climate, and economics that follows the fictional character's journey around the world. Since he limits his sampling to just eighty wines, readers might likely disagree with his wine choices from some well-known regions and marvel at the existence of wine in others. Really, Pinot Noir in Kenya? But the reader is given justification for choices made... [T]he wealth of material and the author's thoroughly enjoyable approach make this a valuable addition to any collection. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers.

Choice Reviews

This wine travelogue has become another of my 'throw in the bag' books when I need some light but informative reading. . . . Eighty Wines weighs less than a bottle of water, but I’m able to drink in a lot.

Forbes

Inspired by Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days, Veseth’s personal journey through the complex and compelling world of wine starts and ends on London’s St. James’s Street, home to fine-wine merchants Berry Bros. & Rudd since 1698. Along the way, Veseth tours Bordeaux and Burgundy, where some of the world’s best wines are made, and visits the more uncharted wine-growing territories of Bali, Thailand, and Tasmania. Veseth chooses the wines he profiles based on the ability of each to excite the palate, and the imagination: 'Each of [the] eighty wines must tell a story, [but they] must not just each tell their own story.... They must collectively form a picture and tell a story that reveals a greater truth,' he writes. As a result, reading his book is rather like attending a swanky cocktail party: it contains a vast and varied buffet, with loads of interesting conversational tidbits. The book makes for an entertaining introduction to the world of wines. As an added bonus, the author also provides a bibliography for those wishing to delve deeper into the topic.

Publishers Weekly

Through reading, we can taste meals never eaten or savor wines not yet swallowed. A satisfying book transports readers; a memorable book also transforms them. . . . This nonfiction work takes readers on a rapid, engaging skip and skim around the globe—highlighting the diversity of wines now produced across the planet. . . . An entertaining smatter of the eclectic, a trove of stories and facts not found in other books about wine.

Forbes

Veseth undertakes a global adventure seeking stories of the people, places and cultures that are the essence of what makes wine so unique: an intoxicating enchantment that draws in people from all walks of life. Casting off from the historic Berry Bros. & Rudd wine shop in London, Veseth embarks on a long and fascinating trip that includes not only expected areas, like France, Italy, Australia, and California, but also places less known for wine making, such as Syria, Kenya, and Virginia. Each leg of the journey is documented through interesting stories, with a small selection of representative wines listed at the end of the chapter. A wine economist, Veseth often discusses the varying impacts such influences as war and climate change have on the wine industry in the particular regions.... The final list of wines discussed is much longer than the 80 that readers will anticipate.

Booklist

[An] erudite soul, Mike ‘The Wine Economist’ Veseth, treads a playful path throughout Around the World in 80 Wines, replicating Jules Verne’s classic Around the World in 80 Days. Besides citing and assessing scores of great wines, Veseth breaks out of stuffy academia, seeking out which Spanish wines most exemplify soccer powerhouses Real Madrid and Barcelona, or tracking down and profiling ‘The Mondavi of Mumbai.’ During his journey shadowing the route of Phileas Fogg and Passepartout, readers can glean fascinating minutiae (Thailand’s biggest wine producer is a man who co-founded Red Bull) or go more in-depth on topics such as riesling’s identity crisis or how a major peso crisis helped spawn Argentina’s booming malbec industry.

Star Tribune