Hold'em Poker by David Sklansky Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Hold'em Poker
Book Review: Hold 'Em Poker
Summary: 4 Stars
This is still the 1st best book to read for anyone wanting to play Texas Hold Em. This covers a lot of the basic strategies in simple and clear language. These days you can figure that everyone out there playing Hold Em has read this book or knows the information in it so it's an essential read. After reading this book and playing with the strategies presented, players will probably want to pick up the sequel to this book, Hold Em Poker for Advanced Players. Note: these books are primarily geared toward "ring" play or money tables, not tournament play (although concepts can apply to tournament play). If you eventually feel like you want to try out some hold em tournaments, beware of Sklansky's "Tournament Poker for Advanced Players" book as it tries to cover playing in Texas Hold Em, Omaha, and 7-Card stud tournaments all at once. The information is very general and a little scattershot because of its broad scope.Book Review: Holdem Poker textbook
Summary: 5 Stars
Excellent beginners book that I have read over and over. All meat no fluff. I was able to hold my own in Vegas sitting at a Holdem table for the first time on the strength of this book and playing poker simulations. Highly recommended.Book Review: Just the basics here...
Summary: 4 Stars
I picked this one up because in my search for a poker book I kept running across Sklansky, and where better to start than the book that started it all? At least it was the first to the starting gate, the rest is up in the air. I've been playing for about four years now and have a good grasp on poker itself, but wanted to get a little deeper to see if I can propel my game play that much further. So I started with the basics.
Sklansky gives some very good tips on strategy on various different types of hands, positions, chip stacks and so on. I lot of this was intuitive for me but I had never actually sat down and tried to understand why I did those things, such as raise in order to get the free card in case I don't hit it, or raise if you are one of the first to act just to feel out the players behind you. Sklansky did a great job in describing why many of these steps are taken and explained why it is important to do them. For that I felt I have learned a lot.
On the flip side though he mentioned a lot of ratios and odds and never went into how he did that. He would throw numbers out there and I had no way to relate to it and understand how he came to the math that he did in order to apply it myself. Perhaps that is something intuitive and I just can't grasp it right away, but some explanation would have been good. Also this is a rather basic book on Hold 'Em. Obviously, being 108 pages, it only had the chance to brush up on the basics, but I wish he could have went a little deeper (of course you can also buy his other book with advanced techniques, always a businessman in the wings to get more money out of you).
Over all this was a decent book and help me understand a lot of the basic moves I have already been doing and help with knowing why it is important to do that move and so on. But there is more that I wish he would have done better with, such as some of the math or gone in to more detail. I would still recommend.
3.5 stars.
Book Review: Medicine that doesn't go down easliy
Summary: 2 Stars
A good editor would have been the spoonful of sugar Sklansky's book needs. Priceless information is contained in this volume for beginners. However, the format it's written in is cryptic and it's appended with useless asides, footnotes and references to other points in the book that are so obvious they are distracting such as p.30's "See the probability chapter". Who would buy the book and not read one of the most important chapters? If you buy this book, it will be too difficult to finish and it will sit on your bookshelf and you'll continue to lose money at the poker table. Buy Lou Krieger's book instead of this one and you'll get the same information for half the effort. You'll learn more about the game in less time and you'll find you're also winning more often.
I'm not knocking Sklansky. I'm cheering for the beginner to intermediate poker player who just wants to learn how to play better. An editor would have made this book a much easier read and much more visually appealing. Sklansky's gamble at remaining the only name to receive payment from its sales sorely degrades the overall value of having this book in your collection. A good re-write would make it a much better read and a more popular book. And he probably would have made more money in the end with his publishing career.
Book Review: Must Have Book!
Summary: 5 Stars
Incredible book! David Sklansky is probably one of the most versed authors on the subject, and has a great series of books on Holdem. I increase my winnings by 150% after implementing the simple system presented in his books. Doyle Brunson's Super Systems has a run for its money as the "Bible" of holdem against this book!If you want to win consistently, you MUST have this book!