Review of Winning Secrets of Poker

Title:

Winning Secrets of Poker

Author:

Peter Thomas Fornatale

Publisher:

Daily Racing Form Press

Date:

2006

ISBN:

1-932910-93-X

Pages:

235

Price:

$24.95

Reviewed by Nick Christenson, npc@lvrevealed.com

February 23, 2007

One of the most reliable ways to learn how to do a task well is to learn from those who already know. Most of us won't get the opportunity to ask questions of the best poker players in the world, so we'll have to settle for having someone else do that for us. In Winning Secrets of Poker, Peter Thomas Fornatale extensively interviews 18 people making at least a significant chunk of their livelihood by playing poker. We come to understand something of how they approach the game from these conversations.

Fornatale interviews an intriguing mix of players. He talks to true poker celebrities from the tournament circuit, such as Phil Hellmuth, Daniel Negreanu, Jennifer Harman, and Ted Forrest. He consults with poker book authors such as David Sklansky, Ed Miller, Matt Matros, and Matt Lessinger. He also talks to unknown professionals, including three who prefer to remain anonymous. I don't know if the wide variety of people to whom the author talked was due to choice or circumstance, but I greatly appreciated the diversity of voices presented in this book.

While players such as Hellmuth and Negreanu certainly deserve to be included in a book of this nature, one doesn't have to go to great lengths to hear what they have to say about poker from other sources. That doesn't mean that their perspectives aren't important, but I was pleased that among the high power professionals we got to hear from Harman and Forrest, two extremely well-credentialled players who haven't had the same level of saturation in the poker press.

Even more, though, I enjoyed hearing from players I knew much less about. The profiles of Danish professional Morten Erlandsen and the three anonymous professionals were particularly interesting to me because these were perspectives on poker that I hadn't heard before. Conversations with other pros that aren't likely to be household names include Alan Boston, Max Pescatori, and Liz Lieu.

Because Fornatale consulted with such a wide spectrum of professional players, we get some divergent views on how to become a successful poker player. More than a few of these notions are contradictory. At times the author probes a little deeper in an attempt to reconcile some of these discrepancies, but many remain unresolved or lurk under a surface barely scratched. This is entirely understandable, but I would have enjoyed a more vigorous debate on some of these topics.

There are two ways an interview book can work. It can work as entertainment, and Winning Secrets of Poker succeeds in this regard. It can also work as an information source, and while we get some interesting perspectives on poker, there's not as much here as the aspiring poker student might hope. Fornatale asks some strategy-focused questions, but few of the subjects seem prepared to talk in those sorts of specifics in this format.

The bottom line is that I did enjoy this book. I thought the questions were well-considered and the selection of subjects was thoughtful. I found it very reminiscent of the book Gambling Wizards by Richard Munchkin in that it contained good interviews with intriguing people from the world of gambling. Those looking for deep strategic insight, or careful arguments for and against various approaches to the game may feel that the book comes short of what they would hope. However, that doesn't mean it's not worth reading, so I recommend it.

Capsule:

Winning Secrets of Poker is a collection of 18 interviews of successful poker players, running the gamut from celebrities to the anonymous. Personally, I really enjoyed hearing from the wide variety of subjects that author Peter Thomas Fornatale has assembled. The book won't provide all that much for those looking for deep strategic insights, but many of the questions are intriguing which makes this book a worthwhile read for most fans of the game.