Good Declarer Play Books

[kriegel]

Declarer play is definitely the weakest area of my game, and I'm looking for books to help me improve. My biggest problem is visualization (I'm not strong spatially), so books that address that would be best. I'm competent at advanced-level techniques (squeezes, etc.), but sometimes I manage to miss the obvious.

 

I've read Watson's Play of the Hand, The Rodwell Files twice, Bridge Squeezes Complete twice, How to Read Your Opponents' Cards, Countdown to Better Bridge, and others.

 

Thank you.

[Phil]

Lots of things on here, but I think Masterpieces of Declarer Play by Pottage would be a good choice for you if you were available to successfully get through Rodwell.

[the hog]

"Adventures in Card Play" by Geza Ottlick is one of the best books around. The chapter on trump elopement alone is worth the price of the book..

[Stephen Tu]

I like Reese's "over the shoulder" books, "Play these hands with me", "Play bridge with Reese"

[the_clown]

I can only recommend you to download the vugraph files from a good tournament and try to play the hands yourself, (if you click on the declarer you will see only his cards). Then you can compare your play with the play made at the table and see what you could have done better.

[Quantumcat]

For intermediate level:

 

"Take all your chances" by Eddie Kantar is really good. They are problems rather than blocks of text, but the problems are easy enough that you can always get them right if you have the patience to think for a while (I tend to get discouraged when problems are too advanced for me, and stop trying and just read the answers after glancing at the hand for a few seconds). A main benefit is that they are not problems where there is a 100% correct solution (where you make the contract no matter what the opponents have or do) so they are slightly more lateral thinking, and (for some of the harder ones) you might come up with a line but can't be sure you are right (for problems with a 100% correct solution you will know it when you have it) so you keep on thinking and thinking, even after you have the answer - which might help teach you to keep looking even after finding an acceptable line of play, a good habit for anybody.

 

Another one I like (also by Kantar) is "Take your tricks" - full of bite-sized snippets that are quite easy to digest. Perhaps you already know most of them through general experience and recognising situations you've seen before and figured out (example - you have a ten-card trump suit missing the king, and one side suit K third opp. J third with the others short but solid. Cash the ace of trumps, play out the other side suits and ruff their small cards, put an opponent in with the king of trumps and you can't lose more than 2 tricks from the bad side suit) but there will be ones you've never considered, and are awesome, so worthwhile reading just for those.

[Mbodell]

I know you asked for a book, but I think for declarer play the Bridge Master software is really, really good.

[SimonFa]

I know you asked for a book, but I think for declarer play the Bridge Master software is really, really good.

+1

[Statto]

I like Victor Mollo's Winning Bridge. It's basically a well selected set of problems, organized by theme. Some are about defensive play, and some about both, but they tend to be about declarer play. It's well-written too, as is any Mollo book.

[JLOGIC]

Reese is the nuts

[BunnyGo]

I'd recommend Krzystof Martens' Virtual European Championship for a quite difficult (for me, but I think in general) set of problems with (sometimes curt) explanations.

 

The translation was sometimes lacking, but it didn't matter. I still go back and try to do the same problems ever couple months.

[Quantumcat]

I know you asked for a book, but I think for declarer play the Bridge Master software is really, really good.

 

Oh, of course! Bridge Master is fantastic! But make sure you have figured out EVERYTHING that can go wrong and have a very firm plan before you even touch a card, because once you see the danger, it's not so hard to figure out the correct play to avoid it - and then that deal is completely ruined for you, forever. The value in it is in the figuring out, and if that step is even partly skipped then the software will be a waste of money - you can never ever go back to a deal with the same empty mind as you did the first time. From memory, Levels 1 and 2 are really easy, Level 3 requires a bit of thought but still quite gettable, Level 4 is quite hard, but then Level 5 is super easy, if you love squeezes and study them for fun (all the distracting stuff from a hand is stripped away in all of these deals, leaving the lesson part all alone. So that makes it way easier than in real life to spot the squeeze). Can't remember if there is a Level 6. But anyway Levels 3 and 4 are the most valuable, so if you don't think them right through to their conclusion before touching a card, it would be a real shame for you!