Bookworm

The Hard-Boiled Poker Library and Media Center is undergoing significant expansion. Between the Xmas bunny and Poker Source Online, I’m due to receive six new poker books this week.

The books I am receiving via PSO are thanks to my having opened that Bodog account through them a couple of weeks ago. I completed the requirement (to accumulate 200 Bodog points -- not such a tall order), notified PSO that I had, and within a day or so they sent a message telling me the three books they had promised are on the way. From them I’m getting a copy of the original Super System (never owned, though I read a borrowed copy long ago), Super System 2 (have read excerpts, but most is new to me), and David Sklansky’s Hold ‘em for Advanced Players (which repeats some material from other Sklansky books, I think). Now that I think of it, all three of these books contain material I’ve encountered before, but I haven’t had any of ’em sitting here on the shelf to consult and reread.

The other three books I ordered through Amazon with a gift certificate. A couple have already arrived: No Limit Hold ‘em: Theory and Practice by Sklansky and Ed Miller and The Mathematics of Poker by Bill Chen and Jerrod Ankenman.

I’m particularly curious about the Chen/Ankenman book. If you were to pick it up in the bookstore and flip through, all of the graphs and equations probably wouldn’t create a favorable first impression. Even so, I’m gonna go ahead and accept the authors’ claim in the introduction that “the vast majority of the book should be understandable to anyone who has completed high school algebra.” (That’s me -- I hit the calculus wall sometime afterwards.) I can be damn stubborn when it comes to working my way through something difficult like this, so I’m up for the challenge.

The NLH book I will save for later. Have no plans, really, to stop playing limit, but I do want to learn more about NL so as to be somewhat informed when I take the occasional plunge.

The third book I ordered from Amazon was Tom Schneider’s Oops! I Won Too Much Money: Winning Wisdom from the Boardroom to the Poker Table. I’ve become acquainted with Schneider’s wisdom (and wit) via Beyond the Table, a podcast I always look forward to each week. My understanding is that the book contains a number of anecdotes from Schneider’s experience both as a professional high-stakes poker player and in the business world. (Among his extensive corporate experience, Schneider was the Chief Financial Officer of a couple of different companies specializing in golf equipment, even serving as President of one of them.) This isn’t the sort of poker book I’d normally seek out, but I’ve really enjoyed listening to Schneider on the show where he’ll occasionally share some of the stories and/or bits of advice that appear in the book. He’s also way funnier than your average Marmaduke cartoon, so I’m looking forward to enjoying a laugh or two amid the teachings. (Review to come.)

Have to say my experience with Poker Source Online has been very positive thus far. I wrote before about signing up over at Absolute Poker where I was able to start out with a $50 bankroll entirely donated by PSO. And while I’m no longer trying to play the affiliate game with poker sites, I went ahead and signed up as an affiliate with PSO. If you’re interested in free goodies -- i.e., cash, books and other poker-related items, rakeback -- click through via the link I’ve added under “Other Poker Links” and sign on up. Or just click here. And while yr at it go ahead and type in “shamus” in the “referred by” box whenever asked. It’ll be like the Xmas bunny never left.