Darkened Poker
Don't play in the dark...
Book Reviews
I have over 200 books reviews to put on this site very soon.No Limit Hold'em / Limit Hold'em / Tournament Hold'em / Pot Limit Omaha / Omaha High/Low / Stud / Math / Psychology / History
Latest Books
 
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Cowboys Full, The Story Of Poker By James McManus |
Short Summary: This is not a rehash of the history books that have come before it, James McManus did some serious research to come up with a fresh telling of the rise of poker in the States. |
No Limit Hold'em Strategy Poker Books
| Book | Rating | Comment | |
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Harrington on Cash Games, Volume I By Dan Harrington, Bill Robertie |
Short Summary: Good converage of tight aggressive vs loose aggressive and how to counter each, good math examples for bluffing rates and pot control |
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Harrington on Cash Games, Volume II By Dan Harrington, Bill Robertie |
Short Summary: More on the tight aggressive and loose aggressive styles, excellent bankroll managment chapter and bending styles to optimize for weaker games. |
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Power Hold'em Strategy : By Daniel Negreanu |
Short Summary: One of the only books to cover small ball theory. Sadly only the chapters written by Daniel are any good, rest of the books is junk. |
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Play Poker, Quit Work, Sleep Till Noon! : By John Fox |
Short Summary: This is one of the funniest book on poker you will read. Best coverage of position, game selection and mental tests to ensure your ready to play. Also covers tells and verbal manipulation very well. |
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Pot limit & No limit Poker : By Stewart Reuben & Bob Ciaffone |
Summary: First book to cover big betting to stack people and avoid pot commitement, plus a really good collection of articles by two very good writers |
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Professional No-Limit Holdem : By Ed Miller |
Summary: Good explaination of REM concept for hand reading, then explains how to avoid pot commitement yourself and get people pot committed when REM says your ahead. |
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No Limit Holdem Theory and Practice : By David Sklansky, Ed Miller |
Summary: Sklansky is good for coming up with math theory, you have to figure out how to make it practical, but it give you a very solid place to start. |
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Hold'em on the Come : By Rolf Slotboom, Dew Mason |
Summary: Excellent job of explaining how to properly play draws in Hold'em. Review: This book does a excellent job of explaining one of the average poker players biggest leaks. People over estimate their outs in draws and never consider the re-verse implided odds costs when their outs are no good. Although this book is set up for limit hold'em you can do a little math on your own to take into consideration implided odds. Some concepts in the book have to be dropped completely in no limit, such as adding a out if you think you might have the best hand. It presents a fairly simple system that will help people stop making big mistakes, but it is by no means complete enough that people should stop thinking about the topic. |
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Killer Poker Online II : By John Vorhaus |
Summary: Worth the read, strategies and mind games. It is not the most str8 forward writing style and he takes awhile to get to the point. Brings up some good online only issues, tells and adjustments you must for speed of the game and online tilt. |
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Play Poker Like the Pros : By Phil Hellmuth | The biggest problem with this book is it is kind of a watered down version of a lot of books that came before it infused with so much Phil Hellmuth ego that it pisses you off just reading it. The tight play section is only good for the newest of newbies playing against other newbies. His section on player types is just cute named version of the Tight - Loose, Passive - Agressive classification. Then he tries to cover 7 version of poker in the remaining of the book. Since each of these could be be several books on their own, all he gets through is breaking down the starting hands into ranges that you should play and general guidlines of what to do on the flop, turn and river. The examples are not bad and in the description of them he points out some fine points of the pro's of other playing styles. This is quite possibly the biggest value in the book, one pro's examination of the strength and weakness's of other pro's playing styles. | |
 
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Poker Wizards : By Warwick Dunnett |
Summary: This guy blew a good opportunity to make a great book as he got interviews from the games best. Sadly the interviews are not specifically tailored to each individual's strengths in the game; so it is kind of disappointing as he ask everyone a bunch of beginner questions. |
Limit Hold'em Strategy Books
| Book | Rating | Comment | |
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Hold'em Poker for Advanced Players : By David Sklansky, Mason Malmuth |
Summary: This is the book "The Theory of Poker" applied to Hold'em It is geared toward limit so some conversion if needed, but is otherwise an good example of how to apply many general poker concepts to hold'em. Also covers table dynamics and how it should change the math of your game. |
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Improve your poker : By Bob Ciaffone |
Summary: Collection of general topics from 20 years of writting. A bunch of articles on the difference between semi-pro and pro level play. |
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Middle Limit Holdem Poker : By Bob Ciaffone, Jim Brier |
Summary: Explains how to change your game for higher levels In the levels you need to both tighten up and loosen up parts of your game and hand selection and spend more time on hand reading. Tons of info and examples in here help you figure it out. |
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Secrets of Pofessional Poker : By Rolf Slotboom |
Summary: This book is mostly about limit texas hold'em with a final chapters on pot limit omaha. The final chapters omaha are by far the best part of the book. He trys to lay down some rules to follow but they are way to general. |
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Theory of Poker : By David Sklansky |
Summary: This is a bible in poker, it provides math behind all of advanced pokers moves, it is geared toward limit poker so you have to think and convert to NL on your own. It is one book I read every year to see if I have fallen off the path. |
Tournament Hold'em Poker Books
| Book | Rating | Comment | |
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Harrington on Holdem, Tournaments, Volume I: By Dan Harrington, Bill Robertie |
Summary: Solid cover of the basics, cover the styles in poker and how the relate to tourns, also how to defend against them. The biggest reason to read this is to learn how everyone else is playing. |
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Harrionton on Holdem, Tournaments, Volume II: By Dan Harrington, Bill Robertie |
Summary: Good coverage of inflection points, heads up play, and bluffing need for short tables. |
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Harrington on Holdem, Tournaments, Volume III: By Dan Harrington, Bill Robertie | This book gives a ton of examples and then explains his answers, it even goes into a lot of math about all in's and tournament payouts | |
 
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Tournament Poker for Advanced Players : By David Sklansky |
Summary: Again it geared for limit tournaments, so GAP concept is not as applicable. Reverse chip theory good for survival mode play but not as useful for getting deep in NL tourns. The math for making deals is very good to know. |
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Every Hand Revealed: By Gus Hansen |
Summary: This is just his comments and thinking on each hand as he goes, you have to read this in a short time as possible to have all the context in mind to understand what he is doing. But it is raw insight not watered down for print. |
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Tournament Poker for Advanced Players, Expanded Edition: By David Sklansky |
Summary: Has reworked some of the concepts introduced in the first book for no limit. Still recommends a play style that is a little to conservative but it is a solid strategy. |
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Lessons from the Felt : By David Apostolico, Matt Lessinger, Lyle Stuart |
Summary: Interesting tournament plays and pro's thoughts behind them, he found a bunch of crazy plays and then went and found out why people are making them, it is very good insight but you have to keep in mind the context. Your play style and table image is probably different enough that a lot of this will not work. |
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Full Tilt Poker Strategy Guide, Tournament Edition |
Summary: Interesting insights you could use to tune your game but you will not find any full stategy. Rafe Furst provides an interesting training game. |
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Winning Poker Tournaments: One hand at a time | Coming Soon... | |
 
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The Poker Tournament Formula : By Arnold Snyder |
Summary: Do not like all the math in here, but the concept of the Patience Factor, Chips vs Pos vs Cards triangle, and math behind rebuying is new and well done. |
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The Poker Tournament Formula II : By Arnold Snyder |
Summary: Excellent breakdown of slow tournaments, introduces Chip Utility concept, small ball vs long ball, math in the book is a lot stronger this time. Introduces Harringbots crushing strategy. |
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How to win No-Limit Hold'em Tournaments : By Don Vines, Tom McEvoy |
Summary: This might have been good info 10 years ago. But this model of tournaments is way to simple, it teaches survival which does not really work any more. The main author has not won any big tournaments in a long time. |
Pot Limit Omaha Strategy Books
| Book | Rating | Comment | |
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Pot-Limit Omaha Poker : By Jeff Hwang |
Summary: A very good book, it explains how pot limit omaha is vastly differnt than hold'em and the adjustments you have to make. |
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Secrets of Professional Pot-Limit Omaha Poker : By Rolf Slotboom |
Summary: A very good book, it explains how pot limit omaha is vastly differnt than hold'em and the adjustments you have to make. |
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Farha on Omaha : By Sam Farha, Storms Reback |
Summary: He mostly talks about attitude, but does not really give enough details to really help you. His strategy advice is very basic and is covered better in other books. |
Poker related Math Books
| Book | Rating | Comment | |
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The Mathematics of Poker : By William Chen, Jerrod Ankenman |
Summary: Excellent attempt at breaking poker situations down into smaller games that can solved, then used as a starting point for the bigger picture. |
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Game Theory Evolving : By Herbert M. Gintis |
Summary: Excellent examples of Nash Equilibria and mix strategy. Also covers Bayes' Rule, Decision Theory, Dominated Strategies, not directly applicable to poker but gives good basics for how to attack some of pokers problems. |
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Killer Poker by the numbers : By Tony Guerrera, John Vorhau |
Summary: The proper math formulas for draws and re-draws. Its a little basic in the begining but gets to some important formulas on the effects of redraw and calculating safe vs ugly flops for starting hands |
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Two person game theory: By Anatol Rapoport |
Summary: Some game theory for two person problems, minmax, dominating strategy, mixed strategy. A good starter for understanding other book on game theory |
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Bayesian Networks and Decision Graphs: By Finn Jensen |
Summary: This book will give you the backround needed to program AI's that can play poker against or record your play for feedback. |
Poker related Psychology Books
| Book | Rating | Comment | |
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Inside the Poker Mind : By John Feeney, David Sklansky |
Summary: Look into the destructive mind games. Covers how play degrades in tilt, moving up in the limits, and hand reading with counter strategies. |
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How to Think Like a Poker Pro : By Roy Cooke, John Bond, Chris Ferguson |
Summary: Wisdom of a grinder for 20+ years. This guy teaches how to take the right attitude for poker so you do not go through the depression phase when you lose big or run bad. Covers the deductive thinking needed to put hands together and the proper management skills make it a business to go pro. |
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The Drunkard's Walk : By Leonard Mlodinow |
Summary: Why we can not understand random events. This will help you prepare for the tricks your mind plays on you when trying to comprehend random events. You can then begin to understand how to counter the issues and make better decisions. It also gives you a bunch of examples of crazy stuff we misunderstand all the time in life and do not even realize it. |
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Conquering Deception : By Jef Nance |
Summary: Goes into details about how people communicate, how and why they lie, how to change the conversation to avoid getting lied to. If you have a talker in the poker game, this is a great book. |
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Covert Persuasion : By Kevin Hogan, James Speakman |
Summary: Military has gotten interrogation down to 20 min in battle field conditions, this book covers some of those principles. If you have a talker at the table you can work them over time and see if they will give you reliable information. |
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Read'em and Reap : By Joe Navarro |
Summary: Lays some foundation for the why of tells and body language so you can start finding your own in addition to his good list already. |
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Beyond Traps : By James McKenna |
Summary: Excellent look into the types of players, how to reconize them and explot them. Covers many mental traps, how to set and avoid them. |
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Games People Play : By Eric Berne |
Summary: This covers communication patterns, what they mean, why people use certain ones, what they are trying to do. If you have a talker at the poker game you need this book. |
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The Poker Mindset : By Ian Taylor, Matthew Hilger |
Summary: Discusses how to handle loosing, avoid passing blame, introspection, downswings and everything else that keeps you up at night after a bad poker game |
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The Education of a poker pigeon |
Summary: This guys take is that NL is bad, which is a turn off. But do not hold that against him and read the rest of the book. He believes you should look like the idiot at the table to take home the money and tournaments are a waste of time. It is a funny read and he does have a point about how important image is at the limit tables. But this book will not drastically improve your game. |
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Your Best Poker Friend: By Alan N. Schoonmaker |
Summary: He covers all the mental barriers that stop poker players from learning from their mistakes, let emotion get in the way proper decisions, and taking an honest look at your own skills and plans to improve them. |
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Your Worst Poker Enemy: By Alan N. Schoonmaker |
Summary: Covers how stress turns of the high logic brain and moves us to intuition only, how to do self evaluation at the table, how events will affect the mental state of opponents and how to take advantage of it. |
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Fighting Fuzzy Thinking: Poker Gaming & Life By David Sklansky |
Summary: Collection of articals from David Sklansky over the years. Covers many differnt forms of poker and many of them are very good. |
Poker related History Books
| Book | Rating | Comment | |
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The Godfather of poker : By Doyle Brunson |
Summary: Cover growing up, rounding in Texas, the mob in vegas and his transition to online poker. |
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According to Doyle : By Doyle Brunson |
Summary: Talks about all the crazy dangerous games in the old days. |
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Aces and Kings : By Michael Craig |
Summary: Covers old and new legends of the game, how they got to the top of the pile and the crazy shit that happened to them along the way. |
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Big Deal : By Anthony Holden |
Summary: He tries be a pro poker player for a year and make enough to play in the main event at the end of the year. He make it but does not do very well and gives it up. Some funny stories in there. |
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Bigger Deal : By Anthony Holden |
Summary: This is kind of interesting as it is international and you get and idea of how poker is treated everywhere else in the world. He is not that great of a player so it is kind of a painful look, you do not get the glory side that one should be having. |
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Chip tricks |
Summary: Interesting tricks, good descriptions and pictures. Problem with chip tricks is it makes you look like you know what your doing which scares the fish off. |
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Double or Nothing |
Summary: The true story of two guys buying and running a L.V. casino. Will not improve your poker but is a scary look at Nevada state gambling board, cheating, high rollers, politics, and entertainment in the Sin City business. |
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Ghosts at the table |
Summary: Kind of a sad look at the days and poker history It is interesting but many stories end in tragedy or are a little slow getting to the point. Kind of cool since he proves and disproves some myths. |
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Hunting Fish |
Summary: Sort of entertaining look at live poker accross the country. He travels over the US looking for cash games on his way to the commerce. Mostly interesting for how you have to get games in the states where it is illegal. |
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Poker's Strangest Hands |
Summary: Some interesting stories, covering a lot of history, but not really a page turner. |
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Winner takes all: By Christina Binkley |
Summary: The story of three people quest to build and own the big vegas casino's. The most interesting part is the research into how to increase profits since vegas went wall street. |
Stud Strategy Books
| Book | Rating | Comment | |
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Seven card Stud for Advanced Players : By David Sklansky, Mason Malmuth, Ray Zee |
Summary: This is the book "Theory of Poker" applied to stud. It does a good job covering the complexity of stud, how extra streets change the game, memorizing out cards, and covers many common situations and ways to play them. |
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Winning concepts in Draw and Lowball: By Mason Malmulth |
Summary: These are simpler games that can be very well modeled and solved. Mason follows Mike CarlosŐs lead and does a good job breaking it all down. Almost to the point of taking the fun out of the game. |