Caro's Book of Poker Tells

Rating:
Summary: A Poker Classic still helpful today
Review: If your poker library is without this book, it is not complete. If a revised version of this book comes out and has a section devoted to online poker tells it would get the full five stars from me. I give it Four and a Half stars.

Rating:
Summary: Overall, a "good" book - useful, and interesting reading
Review: A classic, and one of the most well known books on poker, it's been published again and again under different publishers with very slight changes over the years.

It's one of the only books on tells, or body language in poker - a bit surprising, considering the hundreds of poker books in print, and the popular conception that tells are a huge part of the game.

Caro, also known as "the Mad Genius of Poker," is a top-level poker player, credited as the best draw player in the world. Or was, at least - draw poker all but died out when other forms became legal in California, and he hasn't been heard from as much since then. Regardless, he's still extremely smart, a great teacher, and is always entertaining reading.

The book covers around fifty different "tells," of various types. Some are general profiling, such as what you can infer about an unfamiliar opponent's style by the way they dress or stack their chips. Most are behavioral - what it means when someone acts immediately, without pausing to think, when someone glances down at their chips after the flop, when they "splash" chips into the pot instead of stacking them, etc. A common theme is that "strong means weak" and "weak means strong" - when they sigh and shrug their shoulders as they raise, get out. It seems so basic, but often holds true even at relatively high levels. There are logical tells too, like when a conservative player bets without looking at his last card in stud, he already has a made hand.

One tell I've found very useful is when a player's hand starts to shake uncontrollably as he or she bets on the last round. Most people's initial thought would be that they're nervous and bluffing. In reality, it usually means they have a nearly unbeatable hand. The shaking is a release of tension; a natural, involuntary response as the nervous uncertainty of the hand's outcome is resolved. The shaking is most likely to occur when the stakes are very meaningful to the player. Sometimes this one is visible even on the WPT or WSOP coverage on TV. Even those who play for thousands every day can't control their reactions when they're suddenly playing for millions.

On the downside, the book's age shows. The pictures are grainy and black-and-white, and highlight fashion trends of the 1980s. Several of the tells are specific to draw poker, like determining whether a player who draws one has two pair or a four-flush; not very useful anymore, but still interesting.

For each tell, the text estimates how many weak, average, and strong players will exhibit the specific behavior, and gives a value for how much you can gain by understanding it and being observant. These are useful as generalizations, such as which will rarely apply in a higher limit game against more experienced players, but the "value per hour" figures are crazy. At the $100 limit, various tells are supposedly worth $11/hour, $96, $43, $128, etc. If that were true, a break-even player who studied this book would suddenly be making thousands per hour.

Reading people's body language isn't nearly that big a part of poker. Most decisions at the table are fairly clear based on the cards and logic. Only in borderline situations do tells become valuable, and even then, you have to be pretty sure your read is accurate; if you fold the best hand on the end based on a read you thought was accurate, when you would have called otherwise, you've just cost yourself the whole pot.

Lots of people have bought this book, or similar material, with the idea of studying it and suddenly making a killing, with no more than a basic understanding of poker. This is misguided, and probably not possible. Technical skill and a solid understanding of poker theory and game situations are far more important. Reading people is a useful and interesting supplement to that, not a replacement for playing well.

That said, I'd recommend this book to anyone. Even casual, kitchen table players will find it readable, interesting, and useful - maybe more so than more experienced players since their opponents will have a lot of obvious tells to be read.

Rating:
Summary: A must read
Review: A must read for any serious poker player, this small book is absolutely the best collection of common poker tells. Highly recommended!

Rating:
Summary: Mike Caro
Review: A very nice book that depicts many of the great aspects of live play...the tell.

Rating:
Summary: I call?.
Review: As a developing player, I found this book a great resource. Caro breaks down the basics of poker tells into a handful of simple, powerful rules. I have read this book from cover to cover, taking the time to study the examples. It is full of information and needs to be studied so it sits next to my bed and I review a section every night.

I am a Texas Hold'em player but this book covers most casino poker games. Most tells are universal to all games unfortunately the presentation in this book moves through the different games. This is why studying the book over time helps extract the information for the reader.

This is a must read book for the serious poker player. You have to take the time to continue learning as you grow as a player. The final thing to do with this book is take what you learn into the poker room. Even just selecting one tell for the night, you will be amazed at how obvious the other players wear their tells.

Rating:
Summary: I call¿.
Review: As a developing player, I found this book a great resource. Caro breaks down the basics of poker tells into a handful of simple, powerful rules. I have read this book from cover to cover, taking the time to study the examples. It is full of information and needs to be studied so it sits next to my bed and I review a section every night.

I am a Texas Hold'em player but this book covers most casino poker games. Most tells are universal to all games unfortunately the presentation in this book moves through the different games. This is why studying the book over time helps extract the information for the reader.

This is a must read book for the serious poker player. You have to take the time to continue learning as you grow as a player. The final thing to do with this book is take what you learn into the poker room. Even just selecting one tell for the night, you will be amazed at how obvious the other players wear their tells.

Rating:
Summary: Don't waste your time with this one
Review: Caro provides very useless information about poker tells. He tries to make it seem like a unique style but to the trained eye like me this book is full of nonsense. If you want to read a book that not only discusses poker tells but goes into useful concepts such as hand selections and investments. You need to purchase Issa Jouaneh's thriller No limit texas hold'em tournaments.

This book will teach you to play like a professional and also will allow you to showcase these skills on the poker table.

Rating:
Summary: Will bring your game to the next level....and beyond
Review: I have been playing NL poker online and limit poker in casinos for about two years. My preferred game is single table tournaments and after a year of success online I decided to put my skills to the test. This book really breaks down the art of poker (that is, the ability to read people)into simple categories of tells understandable and recognizeable by anybody. Armed with my technically sound online skills and my newfound ability to understand the motives and intetnions of other live players, I journeyed to Atlantic City to try my first ever live tournament. My first tournament ever...I finished in first place at the Borgata. I played in one more tournament and took 2nd place. It may sound unbelievable, but with a bit of luck and a powerfull arsenal of reads on common poker tells at my disposal, I walked away with over $10,000 on a total investment of $200.

I am not saying that this book will win you the world series, but it will give you a huge edge over your competition. The reason is this: Without a knowledge of tells, you really only win the pots that your cards dictate. Yes, you can play better cards than your opponents and avoid trap hands, but with a knowledge of tells, you can win 2 types of hands. 1) you win the hands your cards dictate. 2) you win the hands that your oponents cards don't merit. If you can pick up weakness in your opponents, you can win pots just by betting or raising at the right moment and salvage a pot where you might have folded. Similarly, you can better identify when your huge hand might be second best. Caro breaks tells down into 2 main categories. Tells from actors, and tells from those who are unaware. The most important are those from Actors. It is Caro's contention that all of us act at the poker table and in life, it is instinctive and largely subconscious. If you can pick up on these signals, discern what the player wants you to do, and then do the opposite, then you can truly, truly dominate the competition. This book is a MUST HAVE for the serious poker player.

Rating:
Summary: Neat
Review: I loved it. You get to take a look at undestanding and identifying "imperfect" information. Then you can use it as a weapon!

Rating:
Summary: Must have for the beginner!
Review: I purchased this book along with Phil Gordon's 'The Real Deal' as a start to my Poker Library. This was an excellent choice for the beginner!

Caro's Book of Poker Tells is a treasure trove of Poker Behavioral information I was immediately able to relate to. Playing amatuer poker, I could recall incidents detailed in the book where I was taken in by many of the tells displayed, and where I had executed them myself. It's an interesting look at how human behavior factors so prominantly into a game of cards.

Granted, the photos are dates, and the poker tells cover ALL types of games, which, if you aren't familliar with all styles of poker, it might be confusing. But, the book is formatted in a very easy to reference style, and isn't difficult to apply illustrations using one game to another.

This is a definite must for anyone who wants to improve their play as well as understand the psychological element of poker better.