This four-volume publication is the second version, envisaged already at the planning of the project, of the monumental overview of World Englishes, first launched in 2004 as the two-volume Handbook of Varieties of English. The individual contributions, each covering the phonology or morphosyntax of a specific variety, are by and large identical in the 2004 and 2008 versions, but the overall structure is different: the more recent, ‘derived’ version is organized according to region, whereas the two 2004 volumes focused on worldwide phonology and morphosyntax respectively. Admittedly, the new version retains the same organization to a degree, in that each regional volume first features the phonology of all its varieties and then morphosyntax. In my view, this is a pity, as a coherent presentation of a variety would clearly have been more reader-friendly, but it would presumably have required a considerable amount of re-editing.