The Unofficial Guide to Skiing in the West

Rating:
Summary: A detailed, informative, and sometimes opinionated guide.
Review: An excellent guide covering most major ski resorts in the Western U.S. and some in Western Canada.
The guide contains a rating section that compares resorts on almost all imaginable skiing criteria (e.g., beginner terrain, bumps, consisteny of fall lines, etc.), but it's real strength is in the detailed descriptions of the skiing. Each author writes about one region, providing a thorough overview and a sense of the style of skiing available at each resort.
There are are some minor inconsistencies. Some resorts get almost agonizingly detailed treatments, while some (e.g., Whistler / Blackcomb) get a more cursory treatment than the sheer volume of terrain would suggest. The skiing suggestions are quite specific, naming lifts and runs (good), but the trail illustrations provided for each resort lack sufficient detail (bad)- I found that the book works best with an actual trail map in hand. Finally, one might argue that some worthy areas were overlooked, including some Canadian areas and at least one US area (Mount Baker, Washington).
This guide is a must-have for any serious skier- I've used it to check out more than a dozen resorts, and Lito, et al. have yet to steer me wrong.

Rating:
Summary: Most skier friendly guide out there
Review: Gets to the meat of the subject quickly. An easy breakdown of the mountain by ability levels and recommended places to eat and sleep. 1 drawback are the shadowy trail maps.

Rating:
Summary: Most comprehensive guide
Review: If you are a ski fan (like me), and you are eager to ski in great West Coast ski resorts in California, Colorado, and Utah -- look no more. You get this book and you have all the information you need for a few years.

Rating:
Summary: Could use a few improvements but is good.
Review: It is the only book I've seen of its kind. The info. is great. The maps are useless. It could use to have its section on deals on lift tickets (and the like) beefed up.

Rating:
Summary: Lots of details, could use more
Review: This is a really thorough book on just about everyplace out west in terms of ski mountain descriptions -- runs and the like. Whoever was in charge of editing the book's illustrations must not have seen the text, because although the illustrations show runs and lifts, only the lifts are labeled -- but the text usually mentions several runs in the context of a single lift, rendering the descriptions confusing and the maps somewhat useless. The descriptions of the ski areas themselves seem to be a little skimpy

The beginning of the book describes some of the "how-to" stuff in terms of getting good deals and the like, but doesn't go into enough detail about these kinds of things, specifically in reference to particular areas. Surely they must be familiar enough with major destination areas to suggest specifics.

Overall, it's a good read, especially for those unfamiliar with out-west ski options.