Harrington I

Harrington on Holdem, part I

Strategic Play — By Dan Harrington & Bill Robertie

This is the first volume of the Harrington on Holdem trilogy. Harrington's books are widely regarded as THE definitive work on No Limit tournament poker.
The books are also a good read and very informative to those people who don't play tournaments. They are very well written with lots of examples to make them accessible to beginning players.

This first part of the series takes a closer look at the beginning of a tournament, when the blinds are low and everyone still has a large stack.

It starts off explaining the different styles of play that can be profitable in tournaments:
Conservative, Aggressive, and Super-Aggressive and tells you about the different kinds of tournaments. Next it tackles the so-called "reading" of the table and the very important patterns of betting.

The largest part of the book deals with betting pre-flop, on the flop, the turn and the river.
Harrington explains in great detail the different starting hands and when to play them, (or more importantly, when not to). He tells you how to read the structure of the flop and what it means for your hand (and again more importantly, for the possible hands of your opponents).

Value bets, continuation bets and probe bets are all explained, as well as playing a draw and going all-in.

Fun part of the book is that after each subject discussed you are presented with a few problems so you can practice what you have just learned.
Overall, we give the book an 8 out of 10!