New ePub eBooks

New ePub versions of the following ebooks have recently been added to our eBook store, www.ebooksbridge.com. As of the writing of this blog, there are 18 ePUB-format ebooks available for download at www.ebooksbridge.com. More are being added every week! Until the end of September, ALL ebooks with a newly added ePUB format are discounted an additional 10% off. For a complete list, see the “New Products” section.

To Bid Or Not To Bid

by Larry Cohen

Since its publication in 1992, To Bid or Not to Bid has sold over 50,000 copies in English alone and has been published in several other languages. Undoubtedly the best-selling bridge book of the 1990s, its lucid exposition of the empirical Law of Total Tricks (a simple guide to making the right decisions in competitive bridge auctions) has made it a book that literally every serious bridge player just has to read.

Critics’ Viewpoint

“Practical information you’ll use the next time you play, and every time you play”

– Eric Rodwell

“Your gurus think this book will be a classic”

– Alfred Sheinwold & Frank Stewart, L.A. Times

“The gap in bridge literature on the LAW has now been filled, and filled brilliantly.”

– Alan Truscott, New York Times

“Finally, Larry tells us how he won all those tournaments! “

– Zia Mahmood

Countdown to Winning Bridge

by Tim Bourke and Marc Smith

Did you ever notice how the bridge experts always seem to know where every card is? How their finesses always seem to succeed? How their guesses are nearly always perfect? This book won’t teach you to play quite that well, but it will introduce you to some very simple techniques that the experts use on play and defense.

As declarer or defender, counting the hand is the one thing that will help you the most. But how do you keep track of all those cards? This book will show you how — explaining the tricks of the trade, and helping anyone who can count to thirteen to become a much better player. Full of practical examples of how to apply the information you get from counting, this book is sure to improve your game.

Critics’ Viewpoint

“If you have been playing bridge without counting the hand, perhaps for many years, you are about to enter a new world!”

— — David Bird

Bridge Behind Bars

by Julian Pottage and Nick Smith

“There was a loud metallic thud as the outside door closed behind Timothy Newman. So this is my new home then, he thought. Prison. Clink. The slammer. Prison is no place for an ordinary, law-abiding, middle-class guy like me, he reflected. Not even Great Yarborough Prison.”

But it turns out that prison life in Great Yarborough has a silver lining for Tim – bridge. An expert player, he finds that his ability earns him unlooked-for respect amongst his fellow-prisoners, many of whom pass their ‘time’ at the card table. This is a bridge novel filled with unusual characters and great deals — and a bridge game that gives new meaning to the term ‘cut-throat’!

Critics’ Viewpoint

“… fantastic hands, and the way the cast of characters twist and bend all existing and even non-existing bridge rules and etiquette, makes this book a real treat!”

— Jon Sveindahl, Norway

“A lively and unusual title.”

— MidWest Book review

The Bridge Technique series

By David Bird and Marc Smith

Volumes 1, 2, 3, 10, J and Q are now available in ePub format (more from this series will come in the next few weeks)

Short and full of practical examples, each book in the ‘Bridge Technique Series’ takes the reader through the most important aspects of card-play technique at bridge. Where appropriate, play is examined from the point of view both of declarer and defenders. Full of quizzes and chapter reviews, these award-winning books will also reinforce the bridge concepts you learn. At this price, what bridge player could stand not to have all twelve?

Critics’ Viewpoint

“Good quality material and good value.”

– BRIDGE PLUS magazine

“Inexpensive, attractive and well-organized”

– The Toronto Star

“A host of valuable tips.”

– The Toronto Star

“The series will not disappoint.”

– Bridge Plus

“Highly readable, and students will not find reading assignments burdensome.”

– ABTA Quarterly

Elimination Plays, from the Test Your Bridge Technique series

(more in this series coming soon).

by David Bird and Tim Bourke

Test your elimination play! This book is designed to accompany Eliminations and Throw-ins, Book 4 in the Bridge Technique series.

Why should you want to polish your elimination play technique? There are two very good reasons. The first is that it is a relatively easy play to perform. Often you will not even need to keep track of which cards have been played! The second reason is that the opportunities to use this technique, or to defend against it, will arise in nearly every bridge session you play. So the rewards to be gained are considerable.

The basic principles of elimination play are straightforward, but applying them is not always so easy. Rest assured that some serious challenges await you in these pages!

Frank Stewart’s Bridge Club

Frank Stewart’s Bridge Club is no ordinary place. It is the regular haunt of a cast of somehow familiar players: Unlucky Louie, against whom no one ever makes a wrong bid or play; Grapefruit, a man with an unnaturally sour disposition; Cy the Cynic, who knows that the Fates will conspire against him whatever he does; Minnie Bottoms, who tends to mix up jacks and kings but always somehow finds the killing play by mistake; Will Rogers, who never met a hand he didn’t like; Frank himself, whose dry wit will keep you coming back for more; and many others. Pick up bridge pointers, try the quizzes, and have a great time while you do it.

Critics’ Viewpoint:

“Certainly a ‘Bridge Club’ that will provide hours of good fun – and without having to leave the comfort of your own home.”

– The National Post

‘Anyone familiar with Frank Stewart’s bridge column will appreciate his cleverness in packing so much bridge insight into a small space. Even those who do not see it regularly are sure to find his new book, “Frank Stewart’s Bridge Club”, delightful. It is a collection of ninety-six quizzes, overwhelmingly on declarer play, based on material published in his syndicated column. A book for bridge aficionados who like a good read as well as some challenges.’

– ACBL Bulletin

“Entertaining.”

– New York Times

MORE about Amazon Kindle:

Incidentally, I recently discovered a little tidbit about Amazon that was not known to me before.  Apparently, their document conversion process (which is available to customers in the US) only works with PDF documents.  So these wonderful .epub files we’ve been so hard at producing which look FABULOUS on other eReaders that we have tested, if I do say so myself, cannot be directly added to Kindle using Amazon’s service. HOWEVER, fear not, for I believe I found a work-around for this issue.  I tried converting a sample .epub file BACK to a pdf (because the hand diagrams in the .epub file are IMAGES, not text, the formatting with this conversion is not lost in the bridge diagrams) and tried to get Amazon to convert the document to a Kindle format that way.  I believe that this process will retain all of the formatting of the bridge hands, and I am anxiously awaiting the results from Amazon.  I’ll update this blog with more news when I learn the results.