I cannot say anything about the success of bridge (or even chess)
books; my one attempt to publish a chess book being unsuccessful
(though t did lead to my chess history column). However, ifyou want a
somewhat interesting subject that combines chess and bridge, I might
suggest writing about the Hymes family. They seem to have had
extraordinary natural talent at chess and bridge. Edward Hymes was a
remarkably strong chess player of the early 20th century; he played
one of the top 5 boards for the US in cable matches vs Great Britain
for a number of years. He never lost a game in these matches, despite
getting almost no practice during the year. He first appeared in the
chess world leading the Columbia U team to victory in some of the
first intercollege matches, and seems to have been remarkably strong
for a young player who did little training. His brothers were strong
chess players as well, though not in Edward's league.

The next generation of the Hymes family had one of the top bridge
players in the country. At some point an IQ test of top bridge players
was given at a major tournament; Hymes seems to have scored far above
all others. Some still live in the NY area, and you might be able to
get extra information from them.

There are some interesting personal stories as well, IIRC; without
checking my notes, I believe that there were ties to the Bloomingdales
(known for their stores) through marriage.

I was going to write an article about them sometime, but if you really
have knowledge of bridge as well as chess, and you use your often
misdirected energy on such a project, I think you could do a good job
with it; I would be happy to share my notes on the subject.

Jerry Spinrad

On Feb 24, 11:13*am, (Sam Sloan) wrote:
I am about to publish a book about bridge. However, somebody told me
that nobody plays bridge any more.

Is that true? Is bridge play up or down?

Would it be a waste of my time and money to publish a book about
bridge?

Sam Sloan