Customer Reviews

Games You Can't Lose: A Guide for Suckers

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Harry Anderson won acclaim as the affable judge in Night Court. He was also well known for his cameos on Cheers, where he swindled Norm, Cliff and crew with relative ease. Harry Anderson was also a successful magician, and has hosted several cable specials on the subject.

Before all of that, Harry Anderson was a con man, and a good one at that. In this little volume, Anderson sets forth a number of entertaining cons, and strategies that can be used at the bar. For the most part, these swindles are not going to make you rich. In fact, these cons are immediately apparent for most people. If they are not apparent from the start, they will be apparent at the conclusion. It is because of this that Mr. Anderson declares that you must perform these tricks in an entertaining way, or else you might run into some well deserved violence.

This book is not supposed to be a definitive list of street crime. What this book really represents is a system of thinking, a system that you can use to create more of your own games that can provide some fun at the bar.

Anderson also has a decent field guide to avoiding scams. Casinos, carnivals, and street cons are all described. For many people, this should be required reading.

This book is extremely entertaining. Harry Anderson writes in a quick and witty style that gives the reader the sense that Anderson is a throwback to the speakeasies and mobster era.

If you're looking to make money scamming John Q. Public, don't buy this book. If you're looking for a quick and entertaining read that is fairly informative and will provide you some interesting time killers, get this book.

This book is great. The guy who gave it 2 stars is misguided. The bits in this book are priceless. There are several bar bets, stunts, gambling advice and cons. The best part is that it is such a fun read. Definitely read this book some day before you die!!

I first read "Games You Can't Lose" by Harry Anderson over a decade ago. This book sparked my interest in gambling and betting (maybe not a good thing...). That having been said, "Games You Can't Lose" is an amusing little overview of games of chance which is chock full of proposition bets and tricks that would work perfectly at the local tavern to win you a couple of drinks. Anderson has amusing games, such as playing poker by picking the cards you want right out of the deck! (Read the book for the angle.) When you see Anderson playing Judge Stone in Night Court or the recurring bit part in Cheers as "Harry the Hat" you will realize that he really was not acting!

this book has a lot of very cunning tricks you can do to other people and you are guaranteed not to lose at any of them ,which leads to collecting a lot of bets.

You probably are a sucker to buy this book. I enjoy Harry Anderson and the book is amusing, but pretty thin on actual games you can't lose. In fact, it gives more coverage to games you cannot win. I was hoping for a book on what Harry Anderson calls "Cunning Stunts" but there are only a few in the book and a couple of those require cheating. On the other hand, if you think you can win at a casino or at 3 card monte, this book is a fun and simple way to show you just how wrong you are and will easily save you twice what you pay for it.

The book contains a lot of filler dialog to stretch out the "cons" as much as possible. Six to eight pages for something that only needs a page of description. You are the sucker to pay $13 for what could have been about 15 pages of material.

I was looking for a book to actually teach me a few cons, swindles and such-like. Perhaps with cards, perhaps with coins, perhaps just with wit and clever sentence-construction. This is not what the book is about. Its entertainingly written and probably aimed at a teen reader. The first half of the book teaches you a few scams, all of which are a bit on the pants side and most aren't practical in this era. You can proably find better ones doing a 10 minute search on the 'net. The second half of the book is quite interesting. It teaches you the odds in certain casino games (there is a relatively detailed explanation of how and when to do what when playing Blackjack), roulette is also "explained", and "craps" - the dice game. You're also warned about some carnival scams (again, this material is somewhat dated). I was hoping to learn the Three Card Monte and possibly the Three Shell Game - no such luck. All that was said about these games was that you can't win, and even if you do understand how they work, and win - you'll probably get the [heck] beaten out of you. (Actually, in the little story in the book, a staple-gun is used). Give it a miss and search the net instead.