Backgammon Book Suggestions

Book Suggestions

Informal book survey

From:   Chuck Bower
Address:   bower@astro.indiana.edu
Date:   28 December 2005
Subject:   informal bg book survey
Forum:   GammOnLine

There have been a lot of good backgammon books written recently (past 5-6 years). It's time to update the reading list. Suppose you want to design a complete course (beginner --> intermediate --> advanced --> expert). What books and in what order would you recommend? Note that although I don't think there should be a limit on number of books, please make your list efficient. I.e., don't list books that overlap too much.

David Levy writes:

OK, I'll try (and hope not to offend). Walter's book is difficult to place in order as it covers the gamut from beginner to expert. It is also hard to know when to introduce match play. If this were a college course my syllabus of TEXT books would be: * Magriel: Backgammon * Trice: Backgammon Boot Camp * Robertie: Advanced Backgammon, Volumes I and II * Bagai: Classic Backgammon Revisted * Robertie: Modern Backgammon I would assign parallel readings from annotated matches * Woolsey: Amateur vs Expert * Storer: Backgammon Praxis and carefully culled material from Danny Kleinman's works. Gee: wouldn't it be great to have all of the technical material from all of Kleinman's books in one convenient volume? So much of it has withstood the bot onslaught, but is is spread across so many volumes and mixed with stuff of much less interest.

Chuck Bower writes:

> Wouldn't it be great to have all of the technical material from all of > Kleinman's books in one convenient volume? I've thought that exact thing before. Some of his stuff is great and some is, to put it mildly, annoying. Even a good index for all his works would be nice. Like many BG projects that never happen, I'm just adding this one to the list.

Frank Berger writes:

I would like to add: * Woolsey, Heinrich: New Ideas in Backgammon. Still a great book and IMHO as seminal as Magriel's, and much underrated. * Wiggins: Boards, Blots and double Shots. As a short course after Magriel, * Ortega: Fascinating Backgammon might fit well. ciao Frank

GaryO writes:

* Robertie: 501 Essential Backgammon Problems is good, too, any quality lacking (irritating format) is made up by volume.

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