Hex is a deterministic, zero-sum, abstract board game. If you know what this means, and appreciate such games, then you will find the game irresistible. The rules are so simple that you can "see" far down the strategy tree. Draws are impossible. Hex was invented independently by two eminent mathematicians, Piet Hein and Nobel Prize winner John Nash (the latter of _A Beautiful Mind_ fame). The feel of competition that this game provides is intense; one player compared it to a "knife fight in a phone booth." The game demands your best efforts, and rewards them.
If you are talented mathematically, there are chapters which deal with the game in a way that appeals. If not, you will still love to study how the book progresses from the simplest templates to tactics to overall strategy. Annotated games are given, as well as quizzes and problems. Game of expert play are taken from the internet. Hex programs are dicussed. There is a rich treatment of the variants and offshoots of the basic game, although perhaps basic 11 x 11 hex is probably still the best of the bunch. The author creates a rich vocabulary to describe the different aspects of the game, and while the reader may have to slow his reading occasionally and ponder, he will find everything in its proper order and will find that everything makes sense. I found a useful colection of blank boards of different sizes at the back of the book which I photocopied to make studies of the games I have now in progress on the net, and thereby explore the different possible avenues of play by using pencil-and-paper diagrams. Anyone who enjoys abstract games such as chess and go will be cheating himself by not exploring the richness of this book, and the richness and challenge of this game. There are a few typos here and there, but relatively few, and not very distracting.
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