Why You Lose at Bridge

I have been looking for this book. It is HTF and is full of great tips and sayings. Any bridge player needs this.

WHY YOU LOSE AT BRIDGE is a true evergreen. Read it once when you are a beginner. It is truly hard to find such a concise guide how to advance rapidly from the basics. Or, like me - after all it first appeared before I was born - rediscover it if you want to improve faster. Players at all levels will find something fresh and stimulating while reading it.Many books dwell for long pages on the intricacies of the complex game of bridge, but this book really focuses on the essentials, on how to think at the bridge table, and how to remain realistic, especially if you are playing with different partners. And if you have an established partnership, read it together.Walking the fine line between being too aggressive or too conservative is the key to success in bridge, and this book has good advice on how to fine-tune your approach. The pages on competitive bidding are pure gold. The reader will find practical gems like dealing with preempts, hesitations and psychic bids or playing 4-3 fits - just to name a few - which are as important to the matchpoint and team players today as they were for rubber bridge in the forties.The advice to adjust your strategy to the scoring system rings as true for duplicate games today as when this book was written, and can spare you making many bad decisions (and help you make many good ones!), once this way of weighting the pros and cons of a particular action at the table is internalized.To wrap it up, read and re-read it! And it's fun, the characters are memorable and the boards excellent and thought provoking.

The characters are almost painful in their issues but it clearly brings home its points. The game discussed is rubber bridge for money which is not in vogue with my crowd but some of the discussion, particularly the 1st half of the book is somewhat applicable to duplicate. The most interesting thing is the large differences from then to now in almost all aspects of the game.

Some of the advice is antiquated. I would like a more modern book which relates to modern bridge.

This is a reprint of an old book - written in a day when bridge was a different game. That does not mean it's not helpful, as much of the advice is timeless, and his anecdotes are entertaining. It's funny and fun to read. My favorite advice: when it's obvious you and your partner don't have a fit, stop bidding!

At first you might think that a book published 70 years ago can't be that useful. Bridge is such a different game from what it was back then. (The author uses really old school Acol.) But the advice in this book transcends the systems or even the actual game. A lot of the other stuff you read deals with idealized players, but those aren't the people you're playing with. You're playing with the people in this book. And not just in Bridge, in just about any game you play.

This is a well-written and enjoyble classic from one of Britain's premier players of the early 20th century. He offers many excellent ideas on how you can change your general approach to bidding and play to improve your game. Very little on specific techniques.I'm a solid "B" player--competitive at the local level but not so much at regionals or sectionals. Over-all, I was hoping to get more from this book than I did.

My cousin actually wrote this book but people who know far more about bridge than I do say it’s the best book ever written on the subject. It’s been reprinted dozens of times. No, I get absolutely none of the royalties.

Although this book was written in the 1940s and some aspects of it are out of date, this does not significantly detract from most of the advice Mr. Simon gives, which is sharp and perceptive.However, the author comes across as both arrogant and dismissive of anyone not as good at bridge as himself (which appears to be literally everyone). Some of the explanations are so advanced that it is hard to follow them, and the author makes few attempts to clarify what he is saying.Time and again, Mr. Simon calls anyone at good intermediate level or less a “palooka”, which is an outdated term for “bungler”. He makes a half-hearted effort to pretend that the reader is not included in this definition (i.e. everyone else is dim, but not you and me) – but most readers will realise that they themselves are the palookas he is referring to.Historically, the book is fascinating: sadly, bridge clubs no longer consist entirely of people playing for 3d. (or even 6d. – 2½p today) a hundred, with club professionals making typically £1 a day from the members. Also, the emphasis is almost entirely on rubber bridge. Duplicate hardly gets a look-in – and this may be confusing for many modern bridge players.

This book is now over 70 years old, having been originally published in 1945/6, but is certainly not ready for retirement! It is humorous and practical, concentrating on the unspectacular but effective ways to avoid making mistakes and make the most of your cards - and your partner. The first part, on technique, is interesting; the second part, on the psychological aspects of playing with different partners, is virtually unique. We meet people like the Unlucky Expert, the well-meaning but incompetent Mrs Guggenheim, Mr Smug and Futile Willie (the "very bad good player", who uses conventions without real understanding) in our clubs - and if we are honest, we recognise something of them in ourselves. Of course some of the material is dated - bidding has changed considerably since then on both sides of the Atlantic, and the examples concentrate on rubber rather than duplicate bridge - but the key insights come up as fresh as ever. I would definitely have had better results in the last 10 years if I had read this book earlier, for example because I would have had more realistic expectations of what a partner can remember or deduce in a bidding system (unlike the Unlucky Expert)! I remember similar "lightbulb moments" from the chess equivalent, Simon Webb's  Chess for Tigers (Batsford Chess Book) . Sadly, S.J.Simon died relatively young, at 44, only a couple of years after writing this book, which is why it and the equally insightful "Design for Bidding" have never been updated. The content only misses out on a 5 star recommendation because the bidding methods are significantly different from those used today and this could be confusing, especially to newer players; so it comes with a Government Health Warning, but if you can live with this, it is strongly recommended. The important thing is to make you think, and you can then adapt as necessary to your own system and situation.After being out of print for a few years (the previous imprint having been an import from America) it has now been reissued in the UK printed by Amazon itself. Full marks to Amazon for their enterprise in doing this, but not unfortunately for the quality of their work. They have photocopied the front and back covers (from the original English version) and the various hand diagrams (the latter often not very clearly), and juxtaposed them with the text in an incongruous choice of modern font with an over-wide spacing. Curiously, the poor layout makes the readability noticeably worse than the previous American version, and to add insult to injury the price has doubled (compare Simon's other book Cut for Partners). Maybe Amazon should do a deal with the US publishers to copy their version instead. Even the book title is spelt wrong on all the inside pages - "Why You Loose at Bridge"! Do Amazon use proof-readers?! Chess for Tigers (Batsford Chess Book)

This book really worked for me and I have put a number of the practical tips into action and it has improved my play. The book would be useful for all levels of players, the style is clear, slighly humerous and easy to read. The only challenge is reading it on a kindle as it is useful to be able to flick back to the examples given.

A succinct understanding of what you have to do to improve. It's all about numbers and odds

a true classic. well worth reading