Review 105, Bob Rowlands, Dave Huggett, Stephen Cashmore

Reviews

The Monster Book of Basic Declarer Play
by Dave Huggett and Stephen Cashmore

BT Batsford, £12.99, ISBN 0 7134 8882 4

Many of my students ask what beginners books would I recommend, a question I find hard to answer. Since Dave Huggett and Stephen Cashmore are experienced bridge teachers as well as writers, I was quite hopeful that this book would be the answer.

The authors discuss two hundred and forty deals all requiring very basic technique, with the emphasis on acquiring good habits in planning the play. The book is divided into three sections, the first comprising eighty no-trump contracts and the second of eighty deals covering only trump contracts. The third section is slightly more advanced, comprising a mix of no-trump and trump contracts. The first two seemed far too easy, so I used one of my beginners as a guinea pig to see if she found the book helpful. The positive feedback made me realise how wrong I was to have any doubts.

I liked the idea of presenting the same or similar deals with either a different lead of a slightly different contract. This enables the reader to understand how and why circumstances often alter declarer’s line of play. My only criticism of the book was the use of the initials TTA (Total Tricks Available) when analysing no-trump contracts and TLT (Total Losing Tricks) when describing the correct line of play in trump contracts. As a bridge teacher myself, I fully approve of initially mentioning the top tricks before describing the correct line of play so that the reader acquires good habits, but I found the repeated use of TTA and TLT somewhat irritating.

One of the many instructive deals, clearly explained in a very user-friendly style, was the following (Problems 139 and 140). with only the North-South hands given initially for the problem:

	7 5 6 3 Q J 10 7 5 Q J 7 3
J 10 3 K Q J 9 8 3 K 10 8 5		8 6 10 8 7 9 6 4 A 9 6 4 2
	A K Q 9 4 3 A 5 4 2 A K 2 -

Problem 139: 6 by South. Lead: K.
Problem 140: 4 by South. Lead: K.

The answer to Problem 139 is very simple: win with the A, play the A-K-Q hoping for a 3-2 trump break, and then play on diamonds. The answer to Problem 140 (with 8 and 3 interchanged in the East hand), is to explain gently that with twelve tricks possible it would be a shame not to make ten, followed by a clear explanation as to why the reader should win the A and then lead a low trump from hand at trick two.

The clear and concise analysis of each of the two hundred and forty deals will surely help any new player. While £12.99 may seem quite pricey, with two hundred and fifty-six pages and two hundred and forty deals I think it is good value. At last I know what to tell my beginners when they ask me to recommend a bridge book that would help them. Unfortunately my ‘guinea pig’ doesn’t want to give the book back, so I seem to have cost the authors one potential customer.

Bob Rowlands