book review – bringing down the house
Current mood: 
cantankerous
Category: Writing and Poetry
Bringing Down the House, by Ben Mezrich, is a very good read. It is about a group of MIT students who, in the mid-90s, took the Vegas casinos for millions of dollars playing blackjack. This is a true story. A movie, “21″ is being made out of this book, to be released sometime in 2008.
It’s fascinating. The book describes the players’ training. Their tactics and strategy. How and why it worked for as long as it did. The lifestyle the high-rollers live. How the casinos eventually caught on. The intimidation tactics that were used by the casinos when they were caught. And the stupidity of the players by continuing to play once they’d been made.
Fascinating. I couldn’t put it down. I read it in 2 days, and while it’s not intimidating in size, it’s no short book.
Blackjack is mathematically beatable. Casinos will use 6 or 7 decks of cards at once. If you can keep track of how many high cards are left (face cards tend to favor the players), you can identify “hot” decks and only make your big bets when the deck is dealing cards that are in favor of the players. This is what the MIT students did – however they worked in teams, with many low-stakes players counting many different tables. Then they would signal to a roaming high-roller when a deck was favorable. The high-roller makes big bets, wins big, and walks away, waiting for the next signal for a hot deck.
They were unstoppable for several years, and made a shitload of money. Then the casino’s got smart. And then… well, check out the book to see what happens to them.