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Instructional poker books are always helpful, and there's a wide variety of
recently published volumes on strategy that might be a perfect fit for the
poker player on your list - maybe even for you.
One of the most well-reviewed books to come out in recent months is Phil
Gordon's Little Green Book. Gordon, who recently left Celebrity Poker
Showdown, published the poker lifestyle book Poker: The Real Deal last year
and this book is first foray into no-limit strategy. The number of
endorsements for the book from prominent players is convincingly large and
diverse. The consensus seems to be that Gordon's skill for teaching the game
and humility (he says he isn't the world's best player) make this book a
necessity for anyone playing no-limit hold'em. Intermediate players should
benefit from it.
Also geared toward no-limit players is Kill Phil by Blair Rodman & Lee Nelson.
Rodman is a tournament professional who has enjoyed a lot of recent success on
the WPT and at the World Series, and Nelson is the Australasian Grand Champion
player for 2000-2005. 2005 WSOP champ Joseph Hachem describes it as "a
detailed strategy for future tournament-poker champions," while Marcel Luske
said it's "like giving the gun to the rabbit."
If you're looking to shore up a weakness in limit hold'em, Winning Texas
Hold'em might be worth a look. Maroon maintains a weblog known as the Poker
Chronicles, where he has tracked his progression from 5-10 through 30-60 limit
games. His book focuses on limit hold'em, covering the both the full ring game
and the short-handed game so popular online. The only common complaint about
the book is that some odds charts are misprinted and that there are typos in
the text, but any review that has focused on what the book has to offer has
generally been positive.
If the poker player you're shopping for is just as interested in the history
and culture of poker as the play of the game itself, there are a few other
books that might make good picks this Christmas.
The World Series of Poker, the grandaddy of all poker tournaments, is the
subject of Jonathan Grotenstein's - All In: The (Almost) Entirely True Story
of the World Series of Poker. Grotenstein co-authored last year's Poker: The
Real Deal with Phil Gordon, and this year he turns his pen to the history of
the world's original big-money poker tournament. All In is the first
comprehensive account of the growth in the popularity of the World Series of
Poker, from the beginning where a dozen or so players voted Johnny Moss the
best player to the 5,600-strong 2005 Main Event where first place paid a
whopping $7.5 million.
In the category of Books About The Biggest Games In The World this year
there's Michael Craig's The Professor, The Banker, and The Suicide King, an
account of the infamous match played between Texan billionaire banker Andy
Beal and a group of the world's top professional players. With its quick
pacing and exploration of the psychology of the players in the world's biggest
poker game, The Professor makes a great read for anyone who's interested in
the world of high-stakes poker.
Another book exploring the character of a player who competed at the biggest
stakes in the world is Nolan Dalla & Peter Alson's One Of A Kind, a biography
of 3-time WSOP Main Event winner Stu Ungar. Almost universally recognized as
one of the all-time great players, Ungar lived a roller-coaster life of
high-stakes gambling and drug abuse that was brief but burned brightly. Dalla
and Alson explore both his childhood and adult life, tracing his rise from gin
rummy whiz-kid to world champion poker player and his relationships with some
of the most recognized people in the poker world.
Finally, in the poker light reading category, there's Steve Rosenbloom's The
Best Hand I Ever Played. This collection from the Chicago Tribune poker
columnist features 52 interviews with famous poker players of both today and
the past, telling the biggest stories from their careers at the tables. Big
bluffs, big calls, big laydowns, and big beats make up this book of anecdotes
that should interest anyone who plays the game.
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