Already James Halliday has released the second edition of a book whose first edition was only last year. It’s his detailed tasting notes of a series of what he introduces as eclassic’ Australian wines. The inclusion of Jamieson’s Run in the bracket dilutes the currency somewhat for mine, but as he explains, it’s got the show record to put many others to shame. Perhaps that’s more of a comment on the sort of wines admired by show judges, but that’s another issue. Halliday has evolved his own star rating system which he deploys to rank the various vintages of each wine against the best the brand can produce. It would be fascinating to know how he might rank the brands against each other, since that is naturally of key interest to those buying and selling wine. As a resource for collectors this book is quite invaluable, since it covers wines and vintages both rare and obscure to a remarkable degree. Halliday’s unique experience enables him to classify and describe such rare wines as the Woodley Treasure Chest Series, seventeen years of Maurice O’Shea reds and the Para Liqueur Port series from 1878 onwards. It’s an awesome work which, more than anything else I can think of, leaves me with a deep and abiding sense of genuine envy.
