In the earlier days of bridge, a direct cue bid of the opponent’s opening bid was traditionally played as a ‘strong cue bid’, a hand too strong for an ordinary take-out double, and forcing to game. A typical hand was any 4-4-4-1 hand with 18 – 19+ HCP. These occurred so seldom and players found they could be handled by starting with a take-out double anyhow that the direct cue bid was finally put to better use. The most popular use is to show some form of a two-suited hand. The Michaels cu...

Becoming a good declarer starts with some basic principles. All the books tell you the same thing; before playing to Trick 1, think and form a plan. But what should you think about? Players often look at a deal and see a new mystery, a complex problem. They become overwhelmed. Of all the ways of winning tricks, cashing high cards and taking finesses are easiest. But establishing a long suit requires effort and care. To set up intermediate cards, lose tricks you cannot avoid losing. The mos...

When discussing declarer play, the first thing I always suggest is for declarer to try to determine what kind of hand he is dealing with. Proper play of the hand starts with planning your play at Trick 1. After identifying/counting your losers, you need to look for ways to eliminate them. Counting winners too sometimes makes things easier, especially for dummy reversals. After all, there are only a finite number of types of hands, with variations on the themes. Typical hand types include a...

In Know It All: Finding the Impossible Country James Marsh tells of his evolution from a troubled childhood to a long career in Canadian publishing that culminated in the creation of The Canadian Encyclopedia — what one reviewer called “the intellectual equivalent of the building of the CPR.” Through friendships, curiosity, the insights of a charismatic psychiatrist, his passion for books, and the intimate encounters with the authors he met, he championed a diverse and inclusive v...

In Know It All: Finding the Impossible Country James Marsh tells of his evolution from a troubled childhood to a long career in Canadian publishing that culminated in the creation of The Canadian Encyclopedia — what one reviewer called “the intellectual equivalent of the building of the CPR.” Through friendships, curiosity, the insights of a charismatic psychiatrist, his passion for books, and the intimate encounters with the authors he met, he championed a diverse and inclusive v...

This little word is vital in every bridge player’s lexicon in it’s entirety, and especially important is the final syllable- TRY. A clear understanding of this topic should be one of the top priorities of every bridge player. When the dummy comes down, both the declarer and the defenders should be thinking about entries. Declarer is planning the transportation between the hands while the defenders are thinking of how to destroy the communication by removing the entries.

The trump suit adds a dimension that makes bridge so different from other card games. In a suit contract, play is complicated by declarer’s need to keep control. If control is lost, it may be almost impossible to make proper use of one’s strength in the side suits. Before playing to trick one, one should ask what might go wrong? If playing a suit contract, is there a reason not to draw trumps? Or maybe just some of the trumps? Safety plays apply to all suits. Focus is on the trump suit, bu...

On May 17, 1968, at the height of the Vietnam War, nine men and women entered a Selective Service office outside Baltimore. They removed military draft records, took them outside, and set them afire with napalm. The Catholic activists involved in this protest against the war included Daniel and Philip Berrigan; all were found guilty of destroying government property and sentenced to three years in jail. Dan Berrigan fled but later turned himself in.The Trial of the Catonsville Nine...

'He looks upon the murders that he did in fact perform as tiresome and regrettable necessities,' reflected Chief Superintendent Roderick Alleyn on the international crook known as 'the Jampot'.But it was Alleyn's wife Troy who knew 'the Jampot' best: she had shared close quarters with him on the tiny pleasure steamer Zodiac on a cruise along the peaceful rivers of 'Constable country'. And it was she who knew something was badly wrong even before Alleyn was called in to solve the two...

The London season has begun. But while debutantes and chaperones plan their luncheons and balls a deadly blackmailer is stalking the highest echelons of society.Naturally, it falls to charming, aloof Detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn - son of Lady Alleyn - to investigate the case. He has already planted his close friend Lord Robert at the scene. But someone else got to him first . . .Death in a White Tie was first published in 1938 and is perhaps the finest of Ma...

Ten Poets, Volume Two.BY James Domestic, Sam Marsh, E .D. Evans et al.This is the second volume in a series of books showcasing a variety of poets producing excellent, if sometimes unnoticed, work. This collection is intended to act as a primer to check out their other work and / or book them to perform in your city, town or village.Poetry is everywhere and for everyone. Poetry paints pictures with words, tells stories, chews over ideas, can act as catharsis, can ma...

Dubliners gathers fifteen anatomies of early twentieth-century Dublin - domestic interiors, streets, public houses - rendered in the spare prose Joyce called "scrupulous meanness." From "Araby" and "Eveline" to the culminating "The Dead," the collection charts paralysis and sudden "epiphanies," when ordinary gestures reveal moral and historical pressure. Its realist surface, tuned to speech and social detail, quietly seeds modernism: shifting focalization, motifs of snow, light, and stasis...