The FTT Book Review: Take Me To The River

As part of the continuing series of sports books found in my local library, because, well, I'm cheap and indebted and there anyway for the family...

Like other books in this vein that I've read in the past year or so for the blog (Big Time, Positively 5th Street, etc.), River is the first person account of the writer's attempt to take down the big prize at the 2005 World Series of Poker in Las Vegas (aka, the Joe Hachem year). Peter Alson is a NY poker sharp in his early '50s who remembers, alas, when poker was a sordid affair best. He also remembers the decades of failed relationships, and the sole one that has promise, in that he's just popped the question to the one that has outlasted all of the others.

Alson's a fairly solid writer, and he's got a good ear for dialogue and/or fast transcription fingers. He's also very solid at getting in touch with the intermittent stars of the game -- Greg Raymer and others appear in the pages -- without making it all about them. I won't spoil the ending for you, but the river takes on a new dimension, and it's not a bad way to spend a few hundred pages.

Finally, there's this. Every writer who goes to the WSOP complains about the ambience. For the Main Event, you are playing in the equivalent of an airplane hangar, with the days split over multiple points to keep everything moving. Alson is also playing with his own money, admittedly the book advance, but still... so there's tension there that isn't quite so present when the writer is connected or sponsored. But while everyone seems to be very aware that the game is crazy odds, that the casino is nickel and diming them for every chance they can get, and that the play is filled with maniacs who drag the level of play down from what one might expect... well, no one ever leaves this tournament with the promise that they aren't going to return. Instead, the day they bust is the most depressing day of the year, because there's so long until the next WSOP.

I'm not sure I get why that is, really. Sure, the payout here is unmatched, and so is the instant fame that only the ESPN cameras can deliver. But it's not like there isn't *always* a game.

In about two hours, 15 guys will come into my basement Man Space, hand me cash for chips, bust my chops for something or other, and get down to it. In the subsequent one to four hours, I'll do everything I can to take their chips, and they mine. I'll have light butterflies in my stomach, the same way I have every time cards are dealt. If I play well, I'll be pleased with myself no matter what; if I play badly, the reverse is true. And while I do go to casinos a few times a year and feel the same thing but multiplied due to the size of the buy in, the simple fact of the matter is that I really do anticipate hosting this home game for as long as people come to it.

And I really do hope that's still the case later, if I do manage to play the WSOP. Because it's out there, you see... Anyway, read the book. It's a nice piece of work. And maybe one day, I'll write my own.