[shingkit]

Dear all,

I learned the very basic of bridge many years ago but I am literally a beginner.

My development objectives in one or two years:
1. Be familar with standard bidding (hardy's 2/1 and not sayc) and card playing
2. Get to know more advanced bidding and playing (but no need to master or use these)

I already have the two books of Max Hardy's 21st century 2/1 and so i guess i need a modern card playing and defense book. I sort of like Hardy's 21st century series as the language is easy to undertand, and there are many good examples and exercises.

I have never read Audrey Grant's book before. May i know if these books look suitable to me? Or will you recommend me other books?
1. Playing of the hand for the 21st Century (Audrey Grant)
2. Defense in the 21st Century: the heart series (Audrey Grant)
3. Improving your judgement 2: Doubles (Audrey Grant)

I don't have much leisure time to read a lot of books and so i really want to invest my time properly. Your advice will be highly appreciated.

Thanks and best regards,

Shingkit

[Stephen Tu]

The fundamentals of cardplay never really change, so you don't need a "modern" card playing book as a beginner. The best cardplay books for beg/int IMO are Bill Root's books, "How to Play a Bridge Hand" & "How to Defend a Bridge Hand". They are clear & easy to read, lots of quiz problems, cover all the basics. Just mastering material in these books will probably make you better than at least 75% of the players out there.

Other possibilities (mostly covering same ground as Root, but if you have time, doesn't hurt to have topics reinforced and to solve different quiz problems)
Eddie Kantar Teaches Modern Bridge Defence + Eddie Kantar Teaches Advanced Bridge Defence
Card Play Technique, Gardener & Mollo
Winning Declarer Play, Dorothy Truscott

When you have finished Root, try some of Kantar's excellent quiz books on declarer play & defense, and go on to material by Terence Reese & Hugh Kelsey, "Killing Defence at Bridge" by Kelsey in particular.

[Antrax]

http://www.bridgebas...nner-book-recs/

[shingkit]

Many thanks Stephen and Antrax. Will try the Root ones.

[Heron]

 Stephen Tu, on 2012-July-11, 22:33, said:

The fundamentals of cardplay never really change, so you don't need a "modern" card playing book as a beginner. The best cardplay books for beg/int IMO are Bill Root's books, "How to Play a Bridge Hand" & "How to Defend a Bridge Hand". They are clear & easy to read, lots of quiz problems, cover all the basics. Just mastering material in these books will probably make you better than at least 75% of the players out there.

The only part of that I disagree with is that I think the 75% number is too low. If you can nail down the stuff just in the first two chapters of "How to Declare..." I think you'll be doing better than 75%, and if you can absorb the whole book it's more like 95%. Maybe higher. I reread it a lot and keep getting more out of it. (I would evaluate my declarer play as pretty good and my bidding as stinky, partly because my serious partners are all over the map bidding-system-wise but declarer play is eternal. Still, there's a beauty to a well-played hand that I find compelling, and with the "highest hand south" robot matches on BBO it's easy enough to get practice anytime.)

The only thing I'd be happier to have seen more of in the book is some discussion of developing the more abstract skills needed to excel, in particular the sense of what one needs to keep track of and ways of remembering it all if one can't remember the fall of all 52 cards. I'd be happy to see any book suggestions people have for this, though arguably this is a question of "play more bridge, and concentrate on what you're doing".

[rmnka447]

Learning to become an excellent bridge player is a process that requires both study and experience. So whatever reading and study you do needs to be paired with playing the game. It's not unreasonable to expect it to take at least a couple years to become a good bridge player.

As a relative beginner, your first objective should be to get well schooled in the fundamentals of the game. So your query about books on basics is most apropriate. The suggestions made by respondents so far have been excellent. As a basic text on card play, I would add "The Classic Book on the Play of the Hand at Bridge" by Louis Watson. Although written in 1934, many still regard it as a definitive fundamental book on all aspects of card play (along with the Gardener and Mollo book). Kantar's two books on defense are destined to be classics, but as a beginner, the first book "Modern Bridge Defense" is more important for you to master. The books by Reese and Kelsey are more intermediate/advanced in nature and probably best left for somewhat later.

Whichever books you choose to read, I would suggest playing for several months following reading them. Then go back and reread them. You will be surprised at how much more you will get out of them. I still go back after 30 years, reread some of these books, and still find them useful.

As far as bidding is concerned, it's OK to learn either 2/1 or SAYC. However, I would suggest keeping whichever approach you use fairly basic and not try to add a lot of extras to it now. It's more important as a beginner to learn the basics of good bidding and develop good bidding judgement. If you add a lot of extra stuff, there is a tendency to get so absorbed in the details of those gadgets that you never really learn the bidding skills required for you to progress to the next level.

If all this emphasis on fundamentals seems a bit much, then please understand that learning to be a good bidder and a player who rarely makes a fundamental card play error will make you a quite formidable bridge player.

[blackshoe]

 rmnka447, on 2012-July-17, 15:38, said:

As far as bidding is concerned, it's OK to learn either 2/1 or SAYC. However, I would suggest keeping whichever approach you use fairly basic and not try to add a lot of extras to it now. It's more important as a beginner to learn the basics of good bidding and develop good bidding judgement. If you add a lot of extra stuff, there is a tendency to get so absorbed in the details of those gadgets that you never really learn the bidding skills required for you to progress to the next level.

If all this emphasis on fundamentals seems a bit much, then please understand that learning to be a good bidder and a player who rarely makes a fundamental card play error will make you a quite formidable bridge player.

Agree with most of this. I would suggest that you would be better off with 2/1 than with SAYC. Either way, I agree with the point about extras, but only up to a point. I would track hands with which you have problems, and then see if there isn't a method you could add to your system that would help. Some good candidates: How to bid after opener's 1NT or 2NT rebid; how to investigate slam after 1NT-2C-2M (I had this problem with one of my partners today. We got to six. 7NT was cold. We got 3 of 12 MPs. Why? No clear agreement on slam methods.) How to investigate slam generally. How to find 3NT after a 1m opening (this isn't always hard, but sometimes it is). But don't take these on until you understand the basic principles of natural bidding.

Another thing: know what is forcing and what isn't. Know to what level it is forcing. I've seen more people get in trouble through not knowing this...

[shingkit]

Thanks all for your kind and valuable advices. These are all treasures to me !

[Quantumcat]

The best beginner/intermediate card play book - Card Play Technique by Victor Mollo (already recommended several times I expect)

The best beginner/intermediate bidding book - The Language of Bidding by Paul Marston.

Both get you off to a fantastic start as a beginner and continue to have new stuff right up until you'd consider yourself a decent bridge player. For instance whenever I make a bidding mistake that is standard knowledge not to make, my exasperated (expert) regular partner tells me to go read Language of Bidding again. And I recently picked up my old copy of Card Play Technique I won as a prize at my first Youth Week just to do the quizzes (it can be enjoyable answering questions you know you will get right :-P) and noticed several whole chapters I didn't really read the first time, because I didn't understand them back then.

Both books are an excellent investment - you won't "grow out of them" nearly as quickly as other books.

Another good book is Take Your Tricks by Eddie Kantar - can be read right from being a beginner, and still read well into being "decent", but not as vital as the two above.

And in a year or two when you feel you are progressing nicely - try Killing Defence at Bridge by Hugh Kelsey, and Take All Your Chances by Eddie Kantar.

[blackshoe]

Hm. I just checked Amazon for The Language of Bidding. Two copies available, by third party vendors. One wants $170, the other $176. I think I'll wait for the reprint.

[Quantumcat]

Hi, it should only cost about $20-$30 AUD. You can buy it direct from the Grand Slam Bridge Centre (which Paul Marston is the owner of), or from Bridge Gear, owned by Paul Lavings. You can email Paul Marston at mail@australianbridge.com, or find the Bridge Gear shop on the net. If you contact Lavings he is often very helpful about recommending appropriate books.

[shingkit]

Thanks all again for the advices which are enlightening. I have now got around ten books on hand now and will start to read and digest. Guess that it will probably take me 2-3 years given my work and family committment. Thanks again !

[neilkaz]

While I don't have Marston's book, I'll strongly second all of Quantumcat's recommendations. Kanter's quiz books (I also have two that now out of print I think from 30 years ago) have clearly helped my declarer play.

.. neilkaz ..

[TylerE]

As far as card play, if you want to get a book knock yourself out, but the one thing that really worked for me was just to play a metric crap-ton of hands - when I was working hard on not sucking I could blow through 100+ hands a night easy, and I was doing that 4-5 nights a week.

[SteveMoe]

Hi Shinkit - I echo Stephen Tu's recommendation and the thoughts of others. It is much more important to master the basics of play and bidding logic than it is to pile on exotic techniques and bidding conventions.

Root's books are gems - they did for me what Stephen predicted for you. I am also a big fan of anything Eddie Kantar and Mike Lawrence do. Try their websites. I particularly like EK's recent books: Take All Your Chances and Take All Your Tricks.

You can find a lot of good stuff on the internet. Here is a link from the Cincinnati Website you might find useful.

I also recommend the FREE software available at the ACBL website (developed by Fred Gitelman). It is free to members and non-members alike.

Also there are some very good interactive CD's available (they tend to be pricier than books). I am used to shopping for them at Baron Barclay Bridge.

Good Luck on your journey - let us know how things go!