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Eudaemonic PieThe Eudaemonic Pie
by Thomas A Bass

What this team set out to do was only possible to get away with during a very narrow window in history. Sharp analytical and electronic skills at the dawn of the microelectronic age made it possible, and at a time when casinos weren't paying much attention to the threat posed by this emerging technology.

Bass has done a great job of telling the story of how a couple of physics postgraduate students and their friends develop tiny computers controlled by toe switches enable them to achieve an edge over the casino at roulette.

"The Eudaemonic Pie" literally changed history, in more ways than one. First: in 1985, the Nevada Legislature was reviewing the bill that would become N.R.S. 465.075 (a bill considerately provided to the legistature by the casinos themselves). The law was meant to outlaw "Devices," and the bill actually specified "card games." When the information published in "The Eudaemonic Pie" came to light, someone had the forethought to change the law so it applied to games other than those in which cards were involved.

The strength of this book is weighted heavily toward the "story" side of the spectrum, and not toward the "telling." There are definitely stylistic weaknesses, but it could be argued that in this case, the story itself is so strong that style might have gotten in the way of the telling.

It reads with the gravity of good fiction, but is all the more satisfying for being true. - Editor.


Paperback - 300 pages (Reprint 7th Feb 2017)  £12.99
Kindle - 337 pages Open Road Distribution; Reprint edition (14 Mar. 2017) £10.79
Audiobook - Listening Length: 12 hours and 27 minutes (7 Sept. 2017) £ Free trial
 


 
Scams Schemes ScumbagsScams Schemes Scumbags
by Pat Silver-Lasky

Think politicians and bankers have just been revealed as fraudsters. Think again! Ponzi schemes, bank schemes that didn't exist, fraud, deception, tricksters and fakers all here in this well researched book

Scams Schemes Scumbags is a book that uncovers stories about shysters, schemers, grifters, scam artists, hoaxers, fraudsters, rogues, and criminal operators from the past and from the present and present each person they write about in a brief story that stands on its own.

It is both entertaining and intelligent and most importantly there is a wide selections of talents on show here and stories from both sides of the pond so that North American, British and European readers will all find something that they have heard of, as well as plenty of others they haven't. From John Zachary DeLorean (wonderful cars) to Victor Lustig (the man who sold the Eiffel Tower for scrap) to PT Barnum (believe-it-or-not freaks), they are all here.

This is one of those books that you can browse through and pick chapters at random at the same time gaining knowledge of how to avoid being taken by such hucksters and laughing all the way. Even those who have been victims of people and companies like these or burned in investment frauds etc will find a laugh on every page. The cartoons also help keep the information light.

A definite must-read for the gambling crowd and a great little stocking filler for those people who really have everything else - they won't have this - Editor.


Paperback - 262 pages (September 2, 2012)  £8.32
Kindle - 264 pages OuroborusBooks.biz (September 2, 2012) £3.78
 


 
The Smart Money: How the World's Best Sports Bettors Beat the Bookies Out of Millions
by Michael Konik

This fascinating inside look at the gambling biz reveals so much information that you would swear the author was breaking some sort of Omerta-like code of silence. The author conceals the identities of the principal players behind fake names, but his fictionalized stand-ins are so compelling (especially the Brain Trust chieftain, Rick "Big Daddy" Matthews) that the book feels like a mixture of true-life expose and high-stakes fiction.

A definite must-read for the gambling crowd. - Editor.


Hardcover -384 pages (14 Nov 2006)   £1.47    


 
The World's Greatest Gambling Scams
by Richard Marcus

"The World's Greatest Gambling Scams" details the best scams ever pulled off in the adrenaline-fuelled gambling world. They range from those relying on basic sleight-of-hand manoeuvres to those that utilise gadgets based on the very latest high-tech wizardry. Scams examined include: the famous Ritz Roulette Scam that used mini-computers and cell phones to determine on what number the roulette ball would drop; big-action baccarat games in which the dealers merely pretended to shuffle the cards; a dye solution for marking casino cards that can only be seen with special contact lenses and disappears without trace an hour after its application; and, a tiny weightless receiver embedded into a roulette ball and controlled by a radio transmitter hidden in a pack of Marlboro cigarettes.

As well as describing the scams from their inception to implementation, Marcus introduces us to the vastly diverse characters who carried them out and analyses what made them tick. This is a well written book. albeit with typos and not a lot spent on proofing. The stories flow really well and its well worth a read. - Editor.


Paperback -360 pages (1 April 2007)   £7.69    


 
Wheel of Fortune
by Archie Morrison and Joe Pieri

Many talented Scots found an exit route from the slums of Glasgow through football, boxing or show business. Archie Morrison discovered another way-through his skills as a croupier.

Starting in the Stakis casinos in Scotland, he was soon headhunted for the Nassau Grand in the Bahamas, and was eventually lured to the gambling mecca of Las Vegas. Here, in Caesar's Palace and the Sands, he dealt the cards, rolled the dice and spun the wheel for Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra and Lee Marvin, and struck up friendships with legendary professional gamblers like Amarillo Slim and Fast Eddie Seremba.

Fortune also provides a unique insider's account on the tricks of the croupier's trade, stories of some of the most outlandish gambling scams ever attempted, and potted biographies of notorious players from the past such as Nick 'the Greek' Dandalos, Sheriff Bat Masterson and 'Calamity' Jane Burke.


Paperback -160 pages (May 2004)   £8.99

 


Ugly Americans
by Ben Mezrich

From the author of the bestseller Bringing Down the House, another extraordinary real-life thriller, a true story of money, risk and life lived close to the edge, set in the Wild East of 1990s Japan. Ugly Americans tells Malcolm's story, and that of others like him, in a cross between Mezrich's own best-selling Bringing Down the House and Michael Lewis' Liar's Poker.

John Malcolm is barely 30, a high school football hero and Princeton graduate, he controls a hedge fund worth USD50m. He made his millions back in the early '90's, a time when dozens of elite young American graduates made their fortunes in hedge funds in the Far East, beating the Japanese at their own game, riding the crashing waves of the Asian markets and winning. Failure meant not only bankruptcy and disgrace a la Nick Leeson, but potentially even death - at the hands of the Japanese Yakuza.


Paperback - 352 pages (July 7, 2005)
£6.39
 

 


The Gamblers
by John Pearson

For over thirty years, John Pearson has provided us with literary exposures of some of the most enigmatic people and underground organisations of our modern world. The Gamblers follows the fortunes of five men at the centre of the ultra-fashionable Clermont Set: the Clermont Club's eccentric founder John Asplnall; Dominic Elwes, who was to betray the Set's code of silence; the socialite owner of Annabel's, Mark Birley; the womanising, multi millionaire James Goldsmith; and the infamous Lord 'Lucky' Lucan.

At the heart of the Set lay a belief that risk-takers are the people who make civilisation tick. Cruel, heartless and snobbish, they gambled with their fortunes and kept a stiff upper lip when they lost. This and a loyalty to each other that transcended everything else enabled them to rise above crises such as the long affair between Birley's wife and James Goldsmith, and the facial mutilation of the Birley's son by one of Aspinall's tigers. Pearson revels in the charisma, charm and wit of these dastardly but debonair millionaires, and reveals how their code led to one of the great unsolved mysteries of the twentieth century.


Hardcover - 240 pages (July 7, 2005)
£12.59
 

 


Double Down : Reflections on Gambling and Loss
by Frederick Barthelme, Steven Barthelme

This slim book by the Barthelme Brothers, recounting their descent into gambling hell, is both elegantly written and horrifying. After all, the Barthelmes are college professors and literary stars, and if their lives could veer out of control so suddenly and so badly, then so could yours and mine. The brothers end up throwing away all their money, including a $300,000 inheritance, at a riverboat casino during the year or so after their parents' deaths. Then -- as if the story couldn't get any more gruesome -- they are indicted on charges of cheating the casino!

Paperback - 208 pages Reprint (21 May, 2001)
expected price £8.03  Buy This Book




 
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