They don't make em like they used to

The pace of this book was off at certain times and the characters were not believable most of the time, even though it was supposedly a true story. If you delve past the surface, you will find out that it is not actually a true story all of the time. The story about testing students at a mob-style poker game is entirely made up and unfortunately this is the best part of the first section in the book, while also being unimaginable. The relationships seemed the same and I imagine that the main character actually hooked up with the rams cheerleader a couple of times, but the book makes it seem as though they dated for years. This was, in the end, worth the read for the cheap thrills and it was a quick one.

This was an interesting read! Very different from my typical genres. The story was fast paced and read like fiction. I kind of doubt I’ll read it again, but I did enjoy it!

I have long wewondered how the MIT students set up their game and how they got caught. This book answers my questions to my satisfaction. And shock enough to be entertained better and better with each chapter.

Bringing Down the House

Ever wonder what some students at elite schools like MIT, Yale, Harvard, and many others do in their free time? Well in the book Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich, you get to learn what a group of geniuses from MIT did and it’s not playing chess or studying or whatever you would expect your average college student at an elite school would be doing. It’s mostly through the perspective of Kevin Lewis a student at MIT who joins a group of card counters after he passes the test. All of these kids are very good with numbers obviously.

They start off in vegas they have a very good strategy. They have secret code words and signs that show when a deck is good or when it is bad. They have small players who are stationed at different tables and usually 3-4 big players who walk around waiting for a sign from the small players to come in when a deck that is promising. Most of the time they get away with it but the casinos are very good at catching things. Sometimes they get thrown out from certain casinos or get warning signs, so they come up with new identities and disguises to try and get around the casinos catching them. They get a lot of really big close calls. But they do win big a lot. Also it goes into detail about Kevin's personal life and how he keeps a regular job while still doing this every weekend. He gets to party with NBA players, go to boxing matches, and live the Vegas lifestyle but then he has a decision to make. Does he want to keep doing this and putting himself at risk or does he want to quit and live a normal and boring life compared to what he's living now.

Personally I really liked the book, I thought it was very interesting and kept me on the edge of my seat most of the time. It was well written and the author was very good at making things suspenseful. I recommend this to anyone who likes to play blackjack or anyone who likes gambling or someone beating the system. This is a book about card counting and them beating the casino (which is very rare) so this would be a good book for anyone who likes that. It is also based off a true story which I thought made it even cooler and more intriguing.

Great subway book. A little dated in references and language but an interesting story well told.

I found Bringing Down the House at a used bookstore weeks ahead of my very first trip to Las Vegas and I took it as kismet. I brought it along for the flight and for any pool time we could muster in the 110+ degree heat.

This was Mezrich's first nonfiction book and in it he tells the story of a MIT graduate who, along with a team of others, learned how to game casinos and win big at blackjack. Their system was fascinating and it worked for a long time...until it didn't.

Mezrich writes really exciting nonfiction and this was the perfect companion to bring to Sin City!

Click here to hear more of my thoughts on this book over on my Booktube channel, abookolive!

Highly recommend this book! It was the perfect length and kept me entertained the entire time. The intelligence level of people blows my mind and this was quite the insight to the world of gambling. You will still never catch me in Encore, but I can see how one could become addicted to this lifestyle. I think my favorite genre of books are biography/ memoirs. My only critic would be the inclusion of more moral take aways or lessons. Also not really sure how the author fit into the story, he felt very random

I started this book not expecting anything at all since my mother recommended it to me and I don't trust her tastes. But fortunately I was wrong and I ended up being really surprised by this book. Just knowing that it is a real story makes you even more thrilled while reading about it and I was sad everytime I had to put this book down. Mostly because I really got attached to the characters (*SPOILERS* even if they don't stick together as a team till the end */SPOILERS*). The writing style was good, the mixed chapters that jumped from one timeline to another was pretty cool too, and the settings in general were fascinating. I never read something about casino, just watched beautiful (but a bit trash) tv series which I still remember dearly from my childhoon! Anyway, exactly because most of the random readers like me don't know anything about casino there's the need of a "world building". Unfortunately it sounded a bit slow and hard to follow since it explained all the blackjack strategies and tricks. I recognize that it was necessary thou. Otherwise I wouldn't have understood a single thing. The other thing that stopped me from rating this higher was the problems I had with the characters. Don't get me wrong I loved all of them! But beside the protagonist, we know almost nothing about them. I wanted to see more characterization, more of the dynamic between the team. More in dept on their relationship with one another, with Mickey (the boss). I really loved him, for example, and we don't see much of him other than from Kevin's pov (and not even that cause we don't see a lot of that "paternal relationship" Kevin describes and feels when talking about Mickey).
So yeah, I recommend reading this book, expecially if you like amazing and slightly creepy open ending! Still sad I cannot read more about team dynamics /3

Interesting story, pedestrian writing. The author doesn't engage any potential themes, just seems content telling the story in a faux-suspenseful, overly sentimental way, and is self-indulgent in including himself in the narrative. It reads like a halfway decent high school report. Nonfiction can be much more skillfully done than this.

The book "Bringing Down the House" By Ben Mezrich, is a fantastic tale about a group of MIT students who develop a strategy that gives them an edge in gambling. This tale, while a true story, is so exciting and outlandish at times, that its very hard to believe. The main character, Kevin Lewis, lives a life most Americans can only dream of, meeting professional basketball players, NFL stars, making millions, and dating an NFL cheerleader. The main character gets so caught up with this fast paced, thrilling lifestyle, that he mistakenly believes it will never end. However just as fast as it all began for him, it came crashing down. Casino authorities were able to develop techniques and security systems that could counter the strategies employed by Kevin Lewis and his team of card counters. It wasn't long before there was not a major casino in the world that Kevin Lewis could safely gamble at. Lewis now not able to depend on his gambling for a livelihood, was forced to refocus on his normal life which consisted of a desk job. Throughout the book, Lewis is always conflicted between the question of whether or not to give up his passion for gambling because he finds that it is preventing him from living a normal life. He feels as if he is living two lives; one in Vegas, the other in Boston. By the end of the book when he realizes the danger involved in card counting, and the power of the casino owners, he knows that it is time to give it up and return to just an average life. Personally, I find this book very applicable to my own life. While its true that I will not at any point in my life be a professional gambler in Vegas, it is, however, true that I will be forced to make difficult choices. Those choices will usually involve conflicting lifestyles. For example, what kind or type of job do I want? Do I want to be a lawyer or a teacher? Kevin Lewis' tale explains and teaches us that not only do you need to choose the job or lifestyle you appreciate and enjoy the most, but also the safest one.

I really resent it when an author states that their work is one of nonfiction, when it isn't. Apparently Mezrich wrote this story based on his meetings with some members of the MIT Blackjack teams. "Bringing Down the House" is a fictional work inspired by real life events. The character's names have been changed and many of the individual characters Medrich writes about, are actually composites of several people. There are places described that don't exist (underground casino in Chinatown) and events written about which never took place. (back room beatings, $75,000 robbery) How do I know this? When the movie "21" (based on this book) was released last year, the Boston Sunday Globe's magazine section ran an article on the book, its author and some of the famed MIT players. It was intriguing and piqued my curiosity. I recently saw the film on DVD, and decided to read the book.
As a fictional work it is a fast read and does hold one's interest. I know nothing about cards, nor gambling, but was intrigued by the premise that a bunch of brilliant students from MIT could use mathematical theories of probability to beat the "house" at Blackjack. Mezrich does succeed in conveying how seductive the gambling world can be, particularly if you are a geeky MIT engineer. The lights, the danger, the money and the thrill induce a drug-like high into these young students and becomes an itch needing continual scratching. The experience corrupts their youthful innocence and one feels a sadness and sense of loss.
Card counting is not illegal so these young people did not violate the law. Most of them paid taxes on their winnings and used the money won to pay off student loans and begin start-up businesses. But it just didn't seem like fun. And I guess that is the sad fact for some who gamble as a career. It certainly isn't the image Las Vegas and our local casinos, Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun, spend millions of advertising dollars in promoting.