In which order should I read these books?

[Bronstein]

Warning: I'm a newbie.
I play only at Party .5/1 and played over 10K hands. I received the following books today:
TOP (Sklansky)
SSHE (Ed Miller)
Hold'Em Poker (Sklansky)
HEFAP (Sklansky)
WLLHE (Lee Jones)
First time I ever played poker was at Party and from 3K on I always 4-table and have +3BB/100 hands (using PE). My knowledge is based on information I got from the internet (SSHE preflop sheet and these forums mainly). I printed some and studied it. So I clearly have lots of thing to learn.
In what order would you suggest I read these books and also why? (As I imagine not everyone will agree with you.)
If it matters: I had lots of math at university so suited connectors, pot odds, ... are things I estimate I can understand (but probably not completely) without having a huge playing experience. Thanks for your advice.

[xenthebrain]

When you have a solid foundation you don't need any Hold'em Poker or WLLH.

Start with SSH then ToP and HEPFAP. ToP makes HEPFAP easier to udnerstand.

[chaz64]

Read these five in this order

Although Ed's GSIH came out after Clark made this post and he might now list that book first rather than WLLH.

[jrz1972]

Based on the bio you've described, you're probably already past WLLHE. Skim through it first to make sure you're not overlooking anything. I've never read Holdem Poker, but its one you should probably just skim over and not dwell on.

Give TOP a good read early to make sure you have a good grounding in general poker concepts, and that your "mathematical poker" is up to speed. You'll want to reread this book several times over the next year or so.


I would do SSHE after I've given TOP one good going-over. You'll want to devote a lot of time to this one, as it's the Bible for beating these sorts of games. Read it, reread it, take notes, read it again, etc.

HEPAP can wait until you've completely mastered SSHE. I wouldn't plan on even cracking it open for several months.

[diebitter]

[ QUOTE ]

TOP (Sklansky)
SSHE (Ed Miller)
Hold'Em Poker (Sklansky)
HEFAP (Sklansky)
WLLHE (Lee Jones)


[/ QUOTE ]
I'd say
WLLHE
Then one you didn't include - Hilger's book on Internet poker (which expands on WLLHE and has good points/examples building on WLLHE + a bit more, such as Pot Equity Edge)
SSHE (which is roughly equivalent to the next part of the course from the first 2, if you view this as an education)

the remaining 3 are very useful, but are more about slightly more advanced stuff, best left (except a superficial skim to be aware of things not really covered in the first 3) till later. Order is:
HEP
TOP
HEFAP

The first three are the ones to read, play, reread, play... etc

The rest offer interesting insights, but the first three are your core texts for the next few months, and will need to be on hand for a long time after.

You picked an excellent set of texts there.

[Fantam]

The only book, which I dont have in your collection is WLLHE, but my understanding is that it encourages very weak-tight play, so I would only glance at that out of interest after I had read the other books.

I would start with Hold'em Poker, mainly because its short, was one of Sklansky's first hold'em books and will quickly take you through all the basics.

Then I would pick up SSHE and read and study this book thoroughly. It is probably THE BOOK in my view for setting you on the right path to winning poker.

After this I would read Theory of Poker for a more conceptual understanding of how to play any form of poker. This book's concepts relates not just to Hold'em, but any other variation of poker as well, and is broadly regarded as possibly the best poker book ever written.

Then I would read HEFAP. This book not only re-inforces all the concepts in SSHE and TOP, but was also written for good players aspiring to move up to the medium and higher stakes levels. So it has a lot of good tips and advice in it.

You may also want to consider getting a copy of "Getting Started in Hold'em" by Ed Miller. I havent got mine yet, but I understand it has similar material to SSHE in it, plus some pretty good new stuff as well.

Enjoy your reading, because you have got plenty to get through now. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[einbert]

You need to read, and this is very important:

Weighing the Odds in Hold 'Em Poker
by King Yao

[Bronstein]

Thanks for all the info so far.
Ordering books takes 3 weeks here so I can't add any to this list, it will be these 5 first. Then others. Correction: I'll start with 4 as HEFAP is over my head.
So to summarize what most players seem to agree on:
First quickly read WLLHE, I should understand it and NOT study it as it is too weak-tight. (A good exercise as I can try to 'upgrade/correct' the book myself [img]/images/graemlins/crazy.gif[/img] )
Read HEP, should be basics and not require too much effort. For sure should be mastered before next one.
Then one very good read of TOP, followed by SSHE. Then many, many rereads of TOP and SSHE. And of course the most important thing: keep following the 2+2 posts.
Only much later HEFAP.
Any more comments on this plan of action?

[Fantam]

Sounds like a good plan.

But if you have HEFAP in your poker library, you may as well read it. It certainly wont do you any harm to do that, and some of the advice will still apply to lower stakes poker.

I think the book, which you will probably be spending most of your time studying is SSHE. Not least, because they have a section of hand examples at the end, which I expect that you will want to go over a number of times.

[theghost]

TOP (Sklansky) - 1
SSHE (Ed Miller) - 2
Hold'Em Poker (Sklansky) - skip it
HEFAP (Sklansky) - 3
WLLHE (Lee Jones) - First or skip it. It's short, so not much to lose. Sounds like you're beating the game so far, so it may not be necessary.

Read Caffione's MLH after SSH (2.5)