Customer Reviews

The Picasso Flop (Texas Hold'em Mysteries)

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

 

 

The story in this book follows the basic conventions of the mystery genre and does an adequate job. Mystery fans with no interest in poker won't hate this book, but it won't make their top ten lists. Some serious poker players will think it emphasizes silly froth over pure poker.

I loved this book for the inside jokes about celebrity poker. If you're a fan, there's all kinds of fun detail, carefully-etched portraits and amusing color. If you're not a fan, and don't know any of the people involved, it will seem like shameless plugs for the World Poker Tour with lots of silliness in between the murders.

This isn't a book for everyone (as the other reviews clearly show), but if you like this sort of thing, it's a five-star book.

Vince Van Patten and Robert J. Randisi launch what will hopefully be the start of a new series with THE PICASSO FLOP. With the Texas Hold'Em and Las Vegas background thrown in, the book delivers a lot of interesting information in an exotic location. Not only that, but there's a murder to solve and an amateur detective that I found easy to root for.

Jimmy Spain is an ex-con and professional poker player. Recently released from prison, he's trying to get his life back together and get his poker game back. But an offer from Landrigan, a guy he met in prison, puts Jimmy squarely in harm's way. Landrigan tells Jimmy he'll pay for all his buy-ins at the poker games as long as he watches over Landrigan's estranged daughter, Kat. Kat, however, can't know that her father is involved.

Kat is brash and somewhat offensive, everything you might expect a 22-year-old hardcase to be. She's got a definite jones for the poker game and plenty of moxie and enough talent to back it up. But Jimmy really doesn't know that much about her.

Only days into the tournament, feeling the effects of his rusty game, Jimmy gets caught up in a murder investigation. One of the prime poker players gets killed and is found with a Picasso Flop, a jack, queen, and king, on his body. The flop is a poker term, and the Picasso part refers to the fact that all the cards are face-cards.

Jimmy realizes just how little he knows about Kat when she lies about him and uses him for her alibi during the time of the murder. There was some bad blood between Kat and the dead man, but was it enough to make her kill him? Trapped between his friend, the poker tournament, and a hard-nosed cop who's got it in for him, Jimmy has to cover all the angles just to stay alive.

Vince Van Patten is one of the top spokesmen on the Texas Hold'Em scene. As host of World Poker Tonight and a frequent player and commentator on the game, he brings a lot of knowledge and connections to the novel. Robert J. Randisi is an accomplished author with hundreds of books to his credit.

Although a little slow going action-wise at first, THE PICASSO FLOP is an excellent read. Randisi's writing is smooth and effortless. Mystery and private-eye fans are going to find a lot to enjoy here. I found myself reading through to the end in a couple sittings. Pick the book up. This one's a sure bet.

I really wanted to enjoy this book since I love watching the WPT poker telecasts and Vince Van Patten's commentary. I also love playing Texas Holdem. However, this book reads like it was written by a fourth grader (not to denigrate fourth graders writing ability). I got to the 10th chapter and decided I couldn't take it anymore. Vince, don't give up your day job....................

I enjoyed the story and the Las Vegas setting. I'm not a poker aficianado so the game play could be dead wrong and I wouldn't know it, though I've watched poker tournaments on TV. I did think the name-dropping of "real" players was used too heavily, to the detriment of developing the fictional characters and should have stayed more in the background for flavor.

I am both a mystery reader (try Harlan Coben) and love poker. I picked this book up as it looked like it would meld these two worlds. Sorry but this book is awful. Its very flat, the characters have no character and you don't indentify or get involved in any one of them.

If you are a poker fan, you will notice a lot of inconsistencies (i.e. main character meets up with young lady in April, just after the completion of the WSOP....NOT, WSOP played in summer time). Also, the scene in the beginning of a high stakes game just doesn't feel real.

I felt like I was at a cocktail party with a person that had very low self-esteem and all they could do was drop names of famous people. Also, the attempt at accents is terrible (southern for Mike Sexton, french for one of the characters).

Bottom line is don't waste your time or money on this book.

Having spent the past decade in jail on a manslaughter conviction, poker guru Jimmy Spain is stunned by the changes. Texas hold 'em is all over TV and the Internet, and women and amateurs participate in tournaments in which a zillion play.

Prison friend Harold Landrigan worries about his daughter Kat, who dreams of making it big in the poker world though her tournament experience is near zero. Harold hires Jimmy to mentor his twenty-two year old daughter Kat; to do so Jimmy enters the Five Diamond World Poker Classic in which she is a participant. He arranges to meet her and cons her into hiring him to train her. When Jimmy manages to meet Kat he make his mentoring her idea. He also meets Sabine Chevalier, but his plan for her is more personal. When someone murders star Tim Bennett, leaving behind THE PICASSO FLOP (a jack, a queen and a king) Kat and Sabine name Jimmy as their alibi. As others are killed with the same calling cards left at the scene, Las Vegas Police Detective Cooper asks Jimmy, the son of a cop, to conduct a supplemental insider investigation.

THE PICASSO FLOP is an interesting poker mystery starring a likable player who is caught between two women, LVPD, and the deadly tournament where someone is not bluffing. The story line is at its best at the card table where the audience will be enthralled while the games are played. The whodunit and Jimmy's background take gallery seats to Texas hold `em as TV poker announcer Vince Van Patten and mystery writer Robert J. Randisi combine to provide a full house.

Harriet Klausner

I listened to this book on tape with my fiance and we both loved it. It is a nice, light book that is interesting, has a unexpected ending, and incorporates poker in a great way. I love mysteries and my Fiance loves poker- both of us loved this book.

Read this one out of curiosity. Not a bad read, especially if you're interested in poker and the poker culture as well as in mystery.

Odd comparison, but bear with me...
I just finished reading Picasso Flop a day or so after Knight Rider came on.. and even with low expectations, both were disappointing. THey shared similar traits... a seemingly fan-friendly idea, and poor execution. Both appear to be hastily thrown together, have shaky (at best) plots, and OH-SO-convenient situations. Perhaps if KITT had driven into the Bellagio in this book, it might have at least made me stop and think something other than "Jeez, this book is so simplistically written..." The jacket desribes the author as the writter of several mysteries...I have a feeling it's quantity over quality if Picasso Flop is any indication. Maybe I'm asking too much from a book released by the WPT. Will I buy future installments? Sure, because I'm a rube that loves poker and will buy just about anything associated with it... and I'll watch Knight RIder every week if it gets picked up, because I loved the original when I was a kid... but that doesn't make them worthy...or any good. Suggestions to both: take a little more time. try harder. make a better product.

I don't know much about poker. If I hadn't caught a few of the shows on cable, I would think that a book with a tag line of "A Texas Hold'em Mystery" was a western-mystery. But sometimes I do turn on the television so I know that Texas Hold'em is the hottest thing in card games for adults.

Enter World Poker Tour commentator Vince Van Patten. He's teamed up with mystery-writer extraordinaire Robert J. Randisi and together they have penned the first in a series called The Picasso Flop.

Ex-poker professional Jimmy Spain has just finished his time in the slammer. He's almost kicked his past but an old cell mate, Harold Landrigan--a wealthy, weathly man--hires Jimmy to keep an eye on his young daughter Kat. Money is no object to Landrigan and Jimmy accepts his more than generous offer. Only thing is, Jimmy can't let Kat know of his connection with her father.

He moves to LA to meet Kat and see if she has any talent at all. She's a whiz at cards. Jimmy takes her under his wing and the duo head off to Vegas for the World Poker Tour at the Bellagio. Thanks to Daddy Harold, both have the buy-in fee for the five-day tournament.

Things are going well for the two until an Internet poker phenom turns up dead, with the Picasso flop--three picture cards--as one of the only clue. It shakes Jimmy and Kat but not their fortitude. Until a poker posse buddy of the dead guy's takes a nose dive nto the hotel's swimming pool also with the same flop floating in the water..

The Picasso Flop is littered with the poker world's most famous names. I have no idea who these people are, but it didn't get in the way of a good story. It helps that the authors do a minute amount of explaining about the game but that helpful little tidbit of info doesn't get in the way.

Jimmy and Kat are compelling characters. For some reason, after I started reading The Picasso Flop, I started calling all the men I know "dude." And that's a word I never thought would be coming out of my mouth!