I guess it’s a simple enough idea, based on Phil Hill’s long-running series of articles on sports-racing Ferraris for Road & Track and Rosso Ferrari. But the magic lies in how it has all been brought together.

Hill won 25 sports car races in Ferraris through the ’50s and early ’60s. In the book he writes about 19 different models, almost all of which he raced at the time.

They weren’t all enormously successful, though most were, but very few of these cars are less than fabulous to look at.

Hill’s early days racing in the US get good coverage — it must have been a great period to watch and compete in. He has a  wonderful knack for giving just enough of every aspect of the models featured — specifications, development, team politics, personalities, his own experience in racing them (some amusing, some tragic, but nearly all successful), subsequent history and owners of the individual cars featured to bring the period to life.

Cars featured in the book include the AAC 815 and the first Corsa Spyder, through the big four-cylinder Monzas, the 4.0-litre V12 MI and the elegant Testa Rossas, to the 1994 333SP.

Each model he drives again to provide a current viewpoint. The book is topped off with a wonderful piece about the Fiat transporters the factory used in the 1950s! John Lamm’s colour photos and the contemporary black-and-white shots are superb, and the large page size really shows them off well.

I remember Dalton Watson doing many one-make photographic books of quite modest size 30 to 40 years ago. This new Ferrari book is on quite a different scale, and the production quality shows the contents off beautifully.

You don’t even need to be a Ferrari fan to enjoy this one.