Bridge books reviewed - 10

This "Bridge at Home" trilogy of books by Tony Forrester is aimed mainly at the home rubber bridge player. Much of the material is from Tony's Daily Telegraph bridge column.                   "Play Bridge at Home" is the first of the three books aimed at the "at home" bridge enthusiast. Clear step-by-step approach to explain the basic rules of rubber bridge and provide a thorough grounding in the skills needed for effective bidding and playing.     "Improve Your Bridge at Home" is a brilliant sequel to the original book. Three sections cover beginner, intermediate and advanced players. The best sections are to be found in the intermediate section where the author discusses how to remember vital principles in bidding and play.     "Winning Bridge at Home" is the concluding volume in the trilogy of books aimed specially at rubber bridge players. It is full of tips and insights from which any bridge player will learn a great deal.     __________________________________________________________________                     "The Bridge Player's Bedside Book" by Tony Forrester is the ultimate collection of bridge stories, with something for everyone from beginner to expert. Humour, mystery, quizzes, history, biography - it's all here. Over fifty world class contributors including Klinger, Sheinwold, Dormer, Kantar and many more.     In "Secrets of Success" Tony Forrester, England's No. 1 player, shares his secrets with aspiring players keen to improve their overall performance. Dealing in turn with constructive bidding, competitive bidding, defence and declarer play, Tony emphasises principles fundamental to successful bridge. These include hand evaluation, inferences, leading, signalling and discarding, and when to overcall.                                                             In "Bridge Master Versus Bridge Amateur " Mark Horton shows what makes a bridge expert, and why he usually comes out on top compared with the club player. No, it's not the ability to execute esoteric squeezes and endplays - they simply don't come up enough to account for the way the experts consistantly win against weaker opposition. This book is a collection of deals that illustrate the difference between the expert player and the would-be expert. These are decisions that will come up in every club game; situations in bidding, play and defence where the amateur will often go wrong, but the expert never will. A study of the concepts in this book will take the reader a long way from amateur status towards actually becoming an expert player.                         In his book "Test Your Match Play", and the sequels "The Tough Game" (buy from Amazon.co.uk) and "The Needle Match", Hugh Walter Kelsey presents the hands from an imaginary high level match and puts the reader in the position of declarer or key defender. When the reader has decided how he would play the hand he turns the page and compares his line with the one recommended. He also learns what happened in the other room, and the knowledge is often salutary The hands are interesting and instructive, but most players will need to be on their best form to finish on the winning side. "Test Your Matchplay" and "The Needle Match" ara unavailable at Amazon.co.uk.                   "365 Winning Bridge Tips" by Danny Kleinman is a collection of basic problems that arise in every session at your local bridge club. An invaluable collection of advice for the improving player, covering all aspects of the game.   "How Good is your Bridge?" by Danny Roth rates your bridge game with a fascinating quiz book on declarer play and defense. The author presents a series of card play problems and assigns the reader a score according to how close to the optimum sloution they get.                       Robert Ewen .       First published in1971, "Opening Leads" by Robert E Ewen is still highly regarded as a textbook, going a long way to bridge the gap between the average player and the expert. The writing style is extremely pleasant with the ocassional touch of unforced humor.   "Opening Leads in Bridge" by Tony Sowter is a guide for tournament players on the factors, including the bidding and your own hand, which indicate the correct choice of opening lead.                       Hugh Kelsey & John Matheson .       "Improve Your Opening Leads" by Hugh Kelsey and John Matheson is a collection of 50 opening lead problems, together with an expert analysis of the options and a discussion of the results. The problems are reasonably difficult, and aimed at intermediate bridge players rather than beginners. They provide good practise both in predicting likely hand shapes from the bidding and in working out probabilities based on them.                         "Michael Lawrence's Opening Leads" is an outstanding and quite complex book discussing how to analyze the auction, evaluate alternatives and choose the best suit and card for your opening lead. Suitable for the intermediate-advanced player. Or buy from Amazon.co.uk                   "Improve Your Opening Leads" by Hugh Kelsey and John Mathesonis a collection of 50 opening lead problems, together with an expert analysis of the options and a discussion of the results. The problems are reasonably difficult, and aimed at intermediate bridge players rather than beginners. They provide good practise both in predicting likely hand shapes from the bidding and in working out probabilities based on them. Or buy from xxx                       John Boeder .       "Thinking About IMPs" by John Boeder concentrates on the tactics involved in winning teams matches. Safety plays, bidding vulnerable games and not giving away big penalties are all covered in detail. This book is unavailable from Amazon.co.uk   Psychic bidding has never been studied in depth before, so Julian Pottage and Peter Burrows have filled a gap in bridge literature with “Psychic Bidding (and its Pitfalls)”. Topics covered include the semi-psych, shift psych, baby psych, controlled psychs, psychic control bids, and psychs at rubber bridge.                   "Northern Lights" by Ray and Linda Lee is a bridge book that's just good fun Actually, I don't guarantee that you won't learn anything while you are reading it, but that's not the main purpose of the book. Here are just a few of the things you'll get to do when reading this book: •  Think about whether it's best to be lucky or be good. •  Learn Culbert's Rules, and when to apply them. •  Find out how Restricted Choice applies to TV game shows. •  Study the Shoe's 3-minute guide to Winning Bridge. •  Discover the psychological laws that drive us to play the game. •  Stay up all night playing for money with David Silver. •  Follow Alice into the Wonderland bridge Club. •  Solve bridge related puzzles. But be warned, this is a bridge book that will live by your bedside and keep you reading far too late at night.                             Easley Blackwood's "Card Play Fundamentals" (buy from Amazon.co.uk) is designed to help you improve your declarer play and defensive techniques. How to develop extra tricks, planning your contract, basic card combinations and much more.                       Ron Klinger .       "Playing to win at bridge: Practical problems for the improving player" by Ron Klinger, is as good a quiz book as ever appeared. The feature that distinguishes this collection from most others is the absence of special themes. Instead of examples of well-known ideas, the author presents truly practical situations. As declarer, you are more likely to be wondering how best to conbine the different chances than how to operate an asoteric squeeze. As a defender, you must worry about youe aces getting away before you turn your thoughts to complex coups.                     "The Times Book of Bridge" volumes 1 and 2 are mainly based on Robert Sheehans articles the the Times newspaper from 1994-1997. They are well crafted books, full of interesting material and striking personalities, from home and abroad. There are bidding and play instructive hands, including a chapter on 'When the Experts Get It Wrong' - always a good read for lesser mortals. There is always in seeing the likes of Zia Mahmood displaying human frailities at the bridge table, especially when the reader can gain from the mistakes made by star players.                         BRIDGE Magazine contributors Tim Bourke and David Bird have joined forces to produce the intriguing book "The Magic of Bridge" which examines many important areas of card play. Each chapter contains a sectiontitled 'In the Conjurors' Den', where the technique under consideration is illustrated by well chosen constructed deals. This is followed by a section called 'Under the Spotlight' where the world's top players exhibit the same techniques in real life from top championships. Each style of play is clearly explained and the reader should feel well capable of executing such plays the next time that they arise at the table.       David Bird Tim Bourke                           Declarer is often faced with the problem of deciding which hand has a specific card. In "Card-Placing for You", (buy from Amazon.co.uk) Andrew Kambities shows you how to process clues from both the bidding and the cards played to obtain the distribution of the suits and the location of missing honour cards. What might appear to be a complete guess is often merely the appliance of logic. There are seven chapters that cover various situations which arise in card placing: 'Percentages in Bridge', 'Simple Counting', 'Making Necessary Assumptions', 'They Can be Made to Talk', 'Interpreting the Play', 'Leads, Signals and Discards', and 'Squeeze or Finesse?'. Each of these chapters discusses the basic themes based around example hands, followed by a short quiz. The final chapter is a 40-hand quiz covering the material covered in the previous chapters.                       Easley Blackwood .       Easley Blackwood's "Complete Book of Opening Leads" is the most comprehensive book ever written on opening leads. Almost every situation imaginable is presented with a wealth of examples from world championship play.       Kit Woolsey .       "Partnership Defense in Bridge" by Kit Woolsey is a detailed discussion of signals, leads, matchpoints, defensive conventions and protecting partner.                       go to the Bridge shop, Bridge CD-ROM's or Bridge book review index or page: - B1, B2, B3, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25,       Visit Bridge Books website for a list of bridge books categorised by content and level.