Hold'em Poker by David Sklansky Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Hold'em Poker
Book Review: Nostalgic and outstanding
Summary: 5 Stars
An outstanding book texas holdem. If you are looking for something that is a little less technical than holdem for advanced players, then this book is for you. It is typical Skalansky, packed with knowledge and great strategy.Book Review: Not that good
Summary: 2 Stars
Maybe my expectations were too high after reading the other reviews, but to say this book is good is an overstatement. While I won't disagree that the information presented in the book is accurate, the statements made in the book and by other reviewers that you need to study this book many times can only be because it is so poorly written.First, there's a well known ranking of hands presented in the book. There's very little explanation as to why hands are ranked the way they are, except for a few obvious examples, so the only way to learn this is to memorize it. I would have preferred a more thorough explanation so I could figure these out on my own. In addition, it would have been nice if these had been presented in some graphical way to make the required memorization easier; in this case they are just a list.
Second, the book then moves on to "Flops you want" and a big table of examples of starting cards with Excellent Flops, Good Flops, and Fair Flops. Again, a nice table but no explanation to help a reader figure out WHY a particular flop is "Excellent," "Good," or "Fair." Again, a few obvious examples of Excellent flops are explained but it's up to the reader to figure the rest out (this is why you have to read it so many times to learn anything; you have to figure everything out on your own).
This pattern continues throughout the book. An idea is presented along with a fairly simple example, but little explanation is provided with each topic to help a reader understand why a particular concept works and most importantly, when a particular strategy is appropriate.
This book is like a flow of the author's thoughts that aren't presented in any logical fasion. He jumps from one example to the next in apparently random order so you just end up confused.
Maybe if I just keep reading it over and over I'll get it. Oh yeah, I remember once hearing that if a reader needs to read something over and over that's the author's fault; I think that applies here!
Book Review: Not what I expected
Summary: 3 Stars
Although this book is rather short, it has some very heavy information that can be useful if studied and practiced thoroughly. However, the information in the book only pertains to limit Hold 'em, not No Limit. Furthermore, the book is a little out of date. However, it does have a lot of good stuff in it, and I would recommend it to any novice player.Book Review: Out of Date
Summary: 2 Stars
This was probably an awesome book when published in 1976, but the book has not been really updated since then, in spite of being reissued in 1997 as a new edition. The only real updating as far as I can tell is the addition of footnotes here and there explaining that some of the specific advice for certain situations may not be valid for the modern double blind structure. This book has a lot of very worthwhile ideas, but most of them are better explained in more detail in Sklansky/Malmuth's Hold'em Poker for Advanced Players, which I highly recommend. Another awesome Sklansky et al book is Small Stakes Hold'em, which I find extremely useful since I don't play in the big leagues. Overall I would rate Hold'em Poker for Advanced Players as much more valuable book than this one, even if you are not yet an advanced player.Book Review: Poker Legend
Summary: 4 Stars
Great Book. This was the book that started all of the detailed analysis of playing poker "correctly"