Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #147523 in Books
• Published on: 2001-01-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 313 pages

Customer Reviews

Insights Rather Than Directions
Gary Carson offers ways to change your thinking about the game of Hold 'Em. I think the book a great buy for beginning and intermediate players.

Firstly, while he does provide a chart of suggested starting-hands as do other Hold 'Em book authors, Carson also provides an entire chapter on the the theory of starting-hand values. It gave me an entirely new view of hand values and position.

Secondly, he gives more new perspectives in the chapter on the theory of flop play. Again, not just directives but insight into defining your hand. His ideas on adjusting your thinking about poker hands from their poker ranking to their money-winning potential gave me a new way to evaluate my holdings.

Finally, I thought his chapter on betting theory alone worth more than the cost of the book in itself. I've certainly more than recouped my money on what I consider to be the clearest and most consise explantions of bet, pot and implied odds. Before this book, I had only bet to get more money into the pot. Carson's list of reasons to bet immediately changed me into a more flexible player.

You won't find a template of play in this book as you do in many others; you'll discover here ways to clarify your thinking that will allow you to make better playing decisions.

Worth your time no matter who you are
This book has several advantages over other hold'em books: readability, price, and usefulness for online poker. It is not, however, a book with loads of new info for the expert, and it does suffer from a few flaws.

Many of the best hold'em books in terms of juicy info are terribly written. Not only is the writing often amateurish, it is just as likely to be convoluted and poorly organized. Important concepts will be buried in the middle of paragraphs in the middle of long sections, while the lead of the section will give no hint that the jewel is buried within. This book is well written and accentuates its important points. While it doesn't contain the wealth of info of say Sklansky/Malmuth, it also doesn't have to be reread five times line by line to absorb.

The price part is obvious. This one's $10.50, its competitors are all over $20. If price matters, buy this one. None of the other books are twice as good if you are only going to read one. That said, if I win one extra pot because of a book I read, it has more than paid for itself, and the investment in hours spent reading is a greater cost than the purchase price.

Why is this so great for online poker? Tons of tables recommending starting hands in a variety of situations (loose, aggressive, early position, late, etc.). Other books provide similar info but there is usually only one table and then the text explains how to deviate (play more suited connectors in this situation, etc.). This one is gloriously redundant, often providing a table that crystallizes those conceptual recommendations. So you can just sit there on the computer with a couple of the tables tabbed and do what the chart tells you to. Do I agree 100% with these tables? No. But they are much closer to "right" than 95% of people would play without them, and keeping them in front of you while you play online will eventually help you learn to understand the theory behind them and deviate as conditions warrant.

As for whether this book is for beginners, intermediates, experts, I think it offers something for each group. For the reasons above, it's great for the first two groups. For experts (I'm not one, but I'm smart enough to know what they want), I found that it did not have as many useful concepts as other books. But it was littered with a few simple observations (that should have been obvious but that I've never seen elsewhere) that made me rethink several areas of my game. So buy it for the small ideas you've missed, not the next-level concepts.

As for the reviews that say he's wrong or contradictory, there is some truth to that. I'm pretty much always going to play AK, I don't care what his tables say. Another example (stated or implied more than once) is he says you shouldn't bet the probable best hand in a loose game when a great draw benefits more from the other loose callers than you do (say you have top pair but you think an opponent has both a flush draw and a straight draw, making him a favorite to beat you eventually). Just because one super draw wins 40% of the time, you only 30%, and the other two players only 10% each doesn't mean you shouldn't bet/raise. Yes the super draw is benefiting from your raises, but he is benefiting at the expense of the other two callers, not you. Don't let your envy of his 60% profit on bets keep you from sucking up your 20% profit. Only if the combined draws are so good that your odds are below the number of callers (here, 1 in 4) should you decline to bet/raise, and the truth is this is rare and you'll rarely know when this happens even if it does. (The one exception, which he did not note in support of his theory but should have, is if the player with the likely-great draw is also the best player at the table. In that case, you may want to begrudge him his profits because they are hard to get back from him. But if you think the worst player has the best draw, then by all means help him get more money to lose.)

Briefly, most of his seemingly contradictory statements are actually both true but he does a poor job of explaining the nuance of how that's possible. But overall I'd say this book is good enough to be worthwhile for everyone and is a definite bargain for beginners.

Clear and Concise
I've just finished Carson's "Complete Book of Hold'em Poker." And while it doesn't go into depth on each of the topics covered in the book, it really is a "complete" book, meaning it touches on all aspects of the game.

Unlike some other poker books, this one reads like it was written by a writer, rather than a poker player. It is very clear and concise -- even the mathematics (a subject I've always had trouble with) is very clearly explained.

Carson deals with the game on a much broader scale than most books I've read. Poker is a very situational game, requiring that play be constantly adapted to the changing conditions. Instead of Carson provides a rote-like "When the table's like this, play like this," he provides the reader with the tools to make those decisions on their own.

There is also an excellent chapter on playing in Brick & Mortar casios, that should shore up the confidence of even the meekest poker player.

His writing is very jargon-ish. There's a lot of talk about "theories" and "models" etc. But I personally like this type of teaching. It's teaching fundamentals rather than a continuous stream of "if ... then" statements.

An excellent beginners book.