Product Description

Winning demands control of the bidding. Before a card is played you must fight for the high ground or hustle your opponents beyond their safe level. Pro-active and fearless but not reckless, you must judge every last auction nuance and, terrier-like, destroy your opponents' communication and confidence whilst enhancing your own. Dodge their snares, resist their ploys but win the high stakes by forcing them to gamble - yourself delivering their misfortunes - and by your willingness to bet on certainty. Whether you are a masterpoint hunter at congresses or an afternoon rubber bridge player, Paul Mendelson's entertaining, thoroughly accessible and incisive text guides you, sharpens your zest and wills you to win.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #39043 in Books
• Published on: 2005-11-15
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 224 pages

About the Author
Paul Mendelson is the author of companion volumes Bridge for Complete Beginners and The Right Way to Play Bridge, the leading book for the improving player, and bridge correspondent of The Financial Times. He began by winning the National Championships and now writes and lectures worldwide.

Customer Reviews

Stunning
My bridge library currently runs to about 150 volumes (sad or what?) and I rate this book one of the best. It is aimed at intermediate level players looking to improve their competitive bidding. Written in an easy didactic style with lots of examples (not dissimilar to e.g Klinger/Kambites) it contains lots of material I haven't come across elsewhere very lucidly explained. For example lots of books discuss the unassuming cue bid in response to partner's overcall: this is the first to explain to me a system of replies when my overcall was not a minimum. All the material is presented in enough detail to allow immediate usage of various conventions without further study - assuming your partner agrees! Furthermore the price is significantly lower than many rivals.All in all a great buy. I for one will be looking for other books by this author.

New concepts (to me) - and very well explained
I play every week at a club. I thought that myself and my partner had quite a comprehensive system, but I was concerned that the opposition interfered with us more than we did with them.
So I bought a book by Marshal Miles which showed as the best-seller in Amazon UK on competitive bidding. It was useless. It is so illogical in parts, that I wonder if they screwed up the print run, and got paragraphs out of sequence! Read my review elsewhere.
I happened to see Paul Mendelson's book in a book shop (Bad news, Amazon). By the time I'd left the shop with it, I was clear the our partnership could make big strides.
Now I've read it all, I'm ready to take on the world. I'm even going to treat my partner to a copy (Good news, Amazon). It's THAT good.
It contains simple concepts - such as competitive bidding being based more on distribution than points - which are explained very clearly, the page presentation is good, and everything is very logical. Most of it sinks in first time. It's brilliant.

Great, but not for the faint-hearted!
This is a really great book, and should be read by any bridge player who is past the beginner level, and wants to iprove their auction techniques.
The book has a hidden motto "It ain't what you've got, it's the way that you use it!", meaning that you can participating in an auction (as opposed to being a mere spectator) no matter how terrible you think your hand is.
It certainly is good for encouraging competitive auctions instead of single-sided ones.
I only give this four stars though because I did find it fairly heavy reading. I am a very intelligent person myself, and found parts of the book rather challenging. Though I did follow it all in the end, and found the content to be of great value!