Amanda Botfeld Releases 'A Girls Guide To Poker' Book

4 years ago
Amanda Botfeld Releases 'A Girls Guide To Poker' Book
08:46
18 Mar

As a beginner’s poker book with a touch of personality and flair, Amanda Botfeld’s 'A Girl’s Guide to Poker' is a welcome addition to the ranks of poker “strategy” books, as well as being a refreshing change from the heavy diet of textbook-style strat offerings that dominate today’s poker market

As Botfeld explains in the book’s forward, as of a few years ago, she’d had virtually no experience with the game. That changed after a few casino trips in Maryland, where she’d moved for her political-research and writing career. For Botfeld, poker quickly jumped from a creative and competitive outlet to a passion, with A Girl’s Guide to Poker part of that growth.

“The idea behind A Girl’s Guide to Poker was originally a 45-minute how-to guide I’d mostly written on a plane,” Botfeld explains in the book’s forward. “I’d never published a book before, nor was I a famous millionaire poker star. But I knew an easy-to-read beginner’s poker book was something that had to be written. I had confidence in my conviction -- which, in my experience, can be pretty powerful.”


After running the concept past some poker-world friends, she was encouraged to pitch the book to some major publishers. One of the largest, D & B Publishing, quickly jumped on the project, with the resulting book a largely pleasing and easy-to-digest effort. The content itself is universal, though it’s targeted to poker beginners. Though it’s far from the first poker book for beginners, most of its predecessors have been clunky and dry. Botfeld’s youthful and professional writing voice makes a refreshing difference.

Botfeld, who now lives in California, also stresses that it’s not a book “for women,” but is rather written by a woman with a distinctive storytelling style. The tips and pointers the book serves up are universal to poker, and the book has been well-received by both women and men seeking to learn how to play the game. That means a focus on the basics, something most advanced poker guides simply aren’t designed to do. Advanced strategy offerings are aimed at helping already-established players climb higher on their learning curves. The best beginners’ books, by contrast, not only teach the basics, they also sell the reader on why investing the time and effort is both worthwhile and fun.

Though a welcome poker-book addition, A Girl’s Guide to Poker isn’t without the occasional flaws. Experienced players might find themselves a touch exasperated by some of the situational logic (or lack thereof, meaning it might not tell the full story). Yet that’s not the point here; the larger game is more about teaching newbies how to think about the game, if they want to enjoy the experience. The fine-tuning, just as this book illustrates, can wait.


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Veteran poker and gambling writer/editor Haley Hintze has provided content throughout the gambling world for nearly 20 years. Widely known for her work on online poker's insider-cheating scandals in the late 2000s, she's been a two-time Global Poker Awards finalist and a prior finalist for Women in ...Read more

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