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Middle Limit Hold’em Poker by Bob Ciaffone and Jim Brier
Overall Score:  
Content:
Organization: 
General Comments:
Ciaffone and Brier have written an intelligent and informed book about limit hold’em for players playing stakes between roughly 10/20 and 40/80. It’s my opinion that Middle Limit Hold'em Poker is relevant for online games as low as 5/10, even though the authors have constructed this book primarily for live play. The authors are both credible and experienced limit players. Ciaffone is well versed in several varieties of poker and has several titles already published; he is also known for finishing 3rd at the Main Event of the World Series of Poker in 1987.
Book Content:
The first thing to know is that you will get many examples to go with the theory. Practically all the chapters have examples, usually between ten and twenty hands to test your understanding of the material. This is beneficial for players who learn well through practical means. Nonetheless, the theory aspect of the book does not suffer, although Middle Limit Hold'em Poker is far less about the theory than say, most Sklansky books.
This book illuminates some interesting ideas. On position, the authors explain the dynamic value of position: position is more important when shorthanded than when there are many players in the pot, how one should not overvalue the button in terms of preflop hand selection, and "Ciaffone’s rule" that having the button is worth about half a small bet, meaning you should not call a raise in the small blind with anything that you would not cold-call a raise with on the button. Flop play is covered extensively in this book. The authors are also very informative when it comes to stealing pots, check/raising and deception from the flop onwards.
Middle Limit Hold'em Poker is great for attacking common player errors such as raising too much with draws, the often-abused free card play and other plays on the 'fake street' (the flop). It is my opinion that this book adjusts the strategy many have learned from Small Stakes Holdem (Miller, Sklansky, Malmuth) to the mid-stakes game where players cannot use these plays with nearly the same liberty. This is important because the recent emphasis on online and low-limit games has left a gap at middle limits which Ciaffone and Brier have made an effort to fill.
The authors have also commented sensibly on the alterations to optimal strategy that one must make when playing shorthanded, with added money in the pot (a dead blind, extra blinds posted or a straddle bet) or with a double bet option on 5th street. For anyone looking to adapt his or her play to every contingency in limit holdem, this book is an excellent resource.
Organization:
The first problem with Middle Limit Hold'em Poker is that there is nothing to ease the strain on one’s eyes after reading pages after pages of block text. Some poker books have pictures, graphs or charts in different chapters, or between them. This book lacks such things totally, which isn’t a problem content-wise but does hurt its score for organization. Better organization of subjects such as starting hand requirements would have been beneficial.
Another criticism I have is that although showing examples is important, at some points the book has too many. Some chapters that have twenty hands for analysis do not warrant so many. Although I found this book invaluable for strategy, I found myself wanting to skip hands after the 15th or so hand in some chapters. The ordering of chapters was also confusing in some cases. I would also have liked to see a more complete appendix with more odds charts and other related material, or else the authors should not have bothered creating one at all. Perhaps the best organizational aspect of the book is the division of chapters. It is easy to find what you’re looking for when over thirty distinct chapters are all titled after what they address and focus on the topic at hand. This made a rather dense book a more useful reference tool.
Book Audience:
I would recommend Middle Limit Hold'em Poker to any limit hold’em players who have read books like Small Stakes Hold’em, but are ready to move up and to learn how to play in tight/aggressive games. This is an advanced book and not intended for beginning players. It is of course relevant for both online and live play, but the focus is clearly on live games. This may be a useful took for players moving from low end internet play into the middle limit games that most live casinos offer.
 
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© 2004, Hollywood Poker 
