Rating: 
Summary: Scarne Knows Poker -- NOT Writing Books
Review: The content of this book is very informative and helpful. It focuses on specific rules of many poker variations and some statistics to go with them. There is no shortage of calculated odds tables in this book for you to try to memorize. However, John Scarne needs to get his money at the poker tables because his writing struggles. You will not be fond of this man after your first 15 minutes of reading. To get through this book, you must have alot of determination; you will not be reading it for fun. Perhaps the toughest, most boring read of my life. In my opinion, any improvement on your poker game is not worth the pain of reading this book. There are other great books that will teach you far more efficiently.
Rating:
Summary: Buy another book...
Review: There are many books out there that no poker enthusiast should be without. This is not one of them. Although mildly entertaining in the beginning due to the author's bombastic nature, the book becomes a truly tedious read. The biggest problem is that the book is dated (1984 copyright) and compiles poker strategy into general rules for five card draw and stud (forget about hold em or omaha). The author then expects the reader to extrapolate the given strategies into seven card games. As an added bonus, most of the strategy (if not obvious even to the most oblivious newbies) is either unsound or irrelevant. The only redeeming value of this book is for those who are seeking an encyclopedia of dealer's choice games. Please save your money or buy another book (Peter Steiner's Thursday Night Poker is superb for amatures, Slansky and Brunson are essential for aspiring pros).
Rating: 
Summary: A requirement for any poker library. Just ignore Mr. Scarne
Review: This book has quite a few good points and strategies along with probability theory. I believe it will greatly improve a beginner and average poker players style if he/she reads and applies some of the basic principles herein. However quite a few of the strategies are common sense (never play with money needed for groceries -- duh).Mr. Scarne himself is an egotist (anyone familiar with John Scarne should know this), so one must take him with a grain of salt while reading. Mr. Scarne believes his poker should be the definitive one. I don't think Scarne's rules will ever be "the rules" for poker, and his "according to Scarne" (takeoff of "according to Hoyle") stance on poker rules is a little outlandish. One must remember for all the card tricks and stunts he can pull (and they are REALLY good!), this man has never won a major poker tournament. You can build a cold deck, but that still is cheating in honest poker. Anyway, get past the man for it is a decent treatise on poker strategy.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent with one exception...
Review: This was a fantastic book and I only have one negative to voice - I realize that Scarne is a poker genius, however a little too much time and space was allocated to him patting himself on the back. I realize this may sound harsh, and for that I apologize, but every time Scarne brings up a point, he feels the need to preface it with a paragragh about how he was guest speaker at this or that convention, blah blah blah, and how many war vets saved millions of dollars on his advice, and he even says several times that he himself is a genius... I must of read that 100 times in this book. A genius should never be self-proclaimed... Enough of my rambling... GREAT BOOK!!! Just needs a more humble approach.
Rating: 
Summary: Scarney-ville
Review: What a joke! Despite will power, desire and a love of the game, I couldn't spend more than several hours trying to read this book. That's several cummulative hours - due to this guy's writing style ("I invented everything"). I've seen other books of his with a photo of himself every other page, "teaching" casino owners about "scarney-roulette", "scarney-craps", "scarney-____" (you fill in the blank). There's even a picture of him and his kid - holding a board game invented by...guess who? Save your money - and more important - your time. Read any other author's thoughts on this game. Scarney's a carnie!
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