If you're a poker fan and know all the big name players, you'll enjoy this one. Some great insight into the world of the professional poker player. The 'suicide king' refers to a playing card, not a person. ( )

The Professor, the Banker, and the Suicide King is the story of the highest stakes poker game of all time, as well as a ring side seat next to some of the best players in the history of poker. The story is Andy Beal, a Texas billionaire (and “the Banker”) who came to Las Vegas and thought he’d play some poker. The low stakes didn’t get it for him, so he gradually moved the stakes up…and then switched to exclusively heads-up play. The line in Rounders says it, “The high stakes attract the fish…and the fish, in turn, attract the sharks.” These stakes were high enough that every professional poker play in the world paid attention. The question, over play spread out over years, became…was Andy Beal a fish?

Maybe the best aspect of this book is the accessibility it gives to non-hardcore poker players. The jargon is explained, and the writer doesn’t bog down in hand-by-hand, card-by-card running commentary. What he does do is give an intimate look (one of the best I’ve seen) at several of the worlds top poker players. Names you’ve heard of…Doyle Brunson, Johnny Chan, Jennifer Harman, Howard Lederer. His access into their poker minds allows him to discuss strategy and how it changed for a group of professionals when they got involved in the richest poker game of all time. The book is also filled with side anecdotes from the history of poker, as well as stories from the 2003 and 2004 World Series of Poker events held in Las Vegas.

This is a quick read, and well written. If poker interests you as a game, or if gambling in general is your thing, or if you are just looking for an insight into the minds of people who do this stuff for a living – then I can’t recommend this one highly enough. ( )