Tag: Books

Positively Fifth Street

Nick Momrik4 Comments

Positively Fifth Street: Murderers, Cheetahs, and Binion's World Series of PokerIf you like poker, this is a book for you. In 2000, author James McManus went to Las Vegas, working for Harper’s Magazine. His job was to write an article on the World Series of Poker and the Ted Binion murder case, which were both taking place. (Read the article.)

McManus ends up winning a satellite tournament to get a seat in the main event of the WSOP, where he ends up making the final table and finishing in 5th place. Positively Fifth Street is his account of the tournament, the Binion murder trial, and a look into his life. Most people simply watch the WSOP on ESPN, but this book gives an entirely new perspective on the event. Bad beats, check raises, slow plays, and all-in calls are recapped down to the rank and suit of each card. The book also explains a lot of the history of poker particularly the contributions made by the Binion family. You learn how Benny Binion took over the tournament that has become the grand-daddy of them all, the WSOP.

While I loved reading his book, McManus did bore me in a couple of places. Some of the parts I didn’t care for were the looks back on his own life, but it is his book, so I skimmed through them, getting back to the nuts and bolts of the story. His writing style is a little tough to get used to, but is put to good use in many places. The style actually reminded me of Dan Brown’s, in that they both know how to add history, definitions, and anecdotes to a story to give it more meaning.

If you are a true poker fan, I’d recommend this book for a different look at the biggest poker tournament in the world. I give it an A.

Digital Fortress

Nick Momrik1 Comment

Digital Fortress : A ThrillerAnother great one by Dan Brown, but ranks 3rd of the three I’ve read so far. This one is a thriller based around the Cryptology department of the NSA. One of the agency’s former employees has created an unbreakable encryption algorithm and threatens to release it to the world if the NSA does not let the country know about their super code breaking computer. As you might guess, things take a turn for the worse.

The character development is very well done, just like Brown’s other books, but it wasn’t as interesting. Some of the computer stuff was obviously interesting to me, but the plot didn’t feel right at times. He spent way too much time going back to the relationship between two of the main characters in the book. Most of it could have been left out.

After reading this 3rd book by Brown I’ve realized a few things:

  • They all take place in a 24-48 hour period.
  • Short chapters are the way to tell a good story.
  • Brown uses 3-4 different parts of the story all at once, but in seperate chapters. This keeps you reading. For instance, you are reading about part 1 and when you finish the chapter, you have to read a few more chapters before getting back to part 1. while you are reading these other chapters, the same thing happens. You never want to put the book down!
  • I love reading about code breaking in his books.

I give Digital Fortress a B+.


Angels & Demons

Nick Momrik4 Comments

Angels & DemonsAnother great book by Dan Brown, author of The Da Vinci Code. I read the majority of the book on the flights to and from Sacramento, and finished up the rest last night. It was another page turner with a lot of suspense.

Just like the previous book I read by Brown there was a lot of code breaking which I really liked. This book was about the Catholic church and the Illuminati, who were attempting to get revenge on the church and destroy it’s following. Robert Langdon, a Harvard professor was the main character again. The character developments done by Brown are awesome. Throughout the story he throws in flashbacks for many of the characters explaining one of their fears or how they came to be where they are in their lives.

There was an insane amount of history in this book again. Brown must research for months and read hundreds of books before he dives into writing his own books, because his facts are top-notch. If you’ve read any of his other books, you should also read this one. I give it a rare A+.

Halo: The Flood

Nick Momrik1 Comment

The Flood (Halo)Great book if you liked the XBOX game Halo, but then again, who doesn’t like that game? As I was reading the book I could recall the exact places in the game that they were mentioning. It makes me want to beat the game again (for like the 5th time).

What I really liked about the book was that I learned about all of the action that happened away from Master Chief on the planet Halo. There was a lot of fighting between the humans and the Covenant that is never mentioned or shown while playing through the game. On the other hand, there are a lot of things that Master Chief does in the game that are skipped in the book, so it is a nice combination between the two.

I do have a complaint though. Halo: Fall of Reach was the first book in the series and was a great book. This book was released second so I read it next, which was great. I picked up what is supposed to be the third book (Halo: First Strike), which was released after The Flood, but the action takes place in between the two books. I’m confused and didn’t like the idea so I decided not to read it right now. Maybe in a few weeks I’ll pick it back up and then might be able to understand why it was done this way.

For now, I give this book an A-.


Halo: The Fall Of Reach

Nick Momrik15 Comments

The Fall of Reach (Halo)If you are a fan of the XBOX game Halo then this book is for you.

It is the first in a series of books based on the video game. I really liked how it fills in all of the gaps in the story. The Fall of Reach explains what happened up until the opening sequences of the game. You learn where Master Chief came from and how he became such a kickass soldier.

I wouldn’t recommend it for someone who can’t appreciate the game, but if was a good read for me. The character developments and plot where more than I could ask for in a book about a video game. It really adds to the whole Halo experience. Now I’m on to the next book, The Flood, which is supposed to tell the story that takes place during the game. So far it’s holding true to form.

I’ll give this book a B+, but only that low because it didn’t knock me off my feet.

The Da Vinci Code

Nick Momrik11 Comments

The Da Vinci CodeI finished reading “The Da Vinci Code” by Dan Brown last night. It is easily the best book I’ve ever read. I’m not a big reader, so that might not be saying much for me, but it has also been a hot item on best seller lists.

It only took me 4 days to read the book (compared to the one day that elapses from start to finish of the story), which is an amazing feat for me. I’ve never read a book so quickly in my life. Hell, I think I’ve taken longer than that to read some of the email messages I receive.

The chapters are really short (the longest was like 10 pages) in his book, which was a major factor in the time it took me to read it. Since I knew the next chapter would be short I was constantly telling myself that I would just read one more chapter and then get to bed. Going to bed would of course take many more chapters than just that one more. Another thing the short chapters helped to do was to keep 3 or 4 different events/places/situations going without getting lost. It was very easy to remember how everything was happening at once.

I couldn’t put the book down since I picked it up. The plot was amazing, especially when you throw in all of the history about Christianity, the bible, Leonardo Da Vinci, and the holy grail. I’ve always hated reading history books because they are so dull and boring, but learning history in a story like Dan Brown can write is like nothing I’ve ever read before. I plan to check out some of his other books or books written by other authors that are in a similar fashion.

I recommend this book to anyone and everyone. It really was that good. Definitely an A++ in my opinion.

Buy And Sell

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During the break in TV coverage of the NCAA tournament I ran downtown to take care of a few things. I traded in 2 XBOX games, Rainbox Six 3 and SSX 3. I put the trade-in value towards a reservation for Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow, which is due out on the 24th. It’s going to be a sweet game. Splinter Cell was unlike any other game ever created and from what I’ve seen, Ubisoft has made some great improvements to the graphics and has even added multi-player play for XBOX Live, which again, is unlike anything out.

I then stopped by Barnes & Noble to pick up a few books. I’ve heard and read good things about The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown so I decided I’d give it a read. Maybe it will give me some new insight into my very confused views on religion. I also picked up Halo: The Flood, Halo: First Strike, and ordered Halo: The Fall Of The Reach. I’ve read a lot of things about the Halo books online and since I loved the video game I figure I can’t go wrong reading them.