On Feb 28, 2:01 pm, Martin Ambuhl wrote:
samsloan wrote:
On Feb 28, 12:20 pm, Will in New Haven
wrote:
On Feb 28, 11:51 am, samsloan wrote:
I might as well tell you now that the Bridge Book I am about to
publish is by Kenneth Harkness. He was a famous chess personality and
a good writer who made his living as the bridge director on ocean
cruises. I am told that he was a strong bridge player too but I do not
know if he won any tournaments or titles.

A far as I can tell neither Kenneth Harkness nor Stanley Edgar (his real
name) ever was a member of a team or pair that placed either first nor
second in any major event. His main importance to Bridge is his
introduction of Swiss system tournaments to the US _chess_ world.



Are you going to have someone edit it so that random things like
"bridge book" don't get capitalized? More seriously, how many copies
do you need to sell to make your nut on this thing? You have a
practically unknown author and _you_ don't have the kind of
information, titles won, for instance, that would make a blurb for the
book more appetizing.

Will in New Haven

Thank you for asking.

The book is a reprint. The book was originally published in 1949. It
was a very successful and popular book at the time. That is the reason
I have been asking if it should be reprinted.

It is an absolute beginners book. It starts out by explaining the
difference between a spade, a diamond, a heart and a club.

You might mention its title, _Invitation to Bridge_. I hope you have
cleared this with the publishers (Simon & Schuster), who date it as
1950. The Library of Congress control number, 50008099, corresponds to
that date. It was neither an important nor "successful and popular" book
at the time it was published. It is even less important now. You may
find a small group of people interested in buying reprints of obscure,
unimportant monographs on bridge, but the number will be very small.

Thank you but Simon & Schuster does not own the copyright on the book.

The Harkness family does.

I appreciate your feedback anyway. I am committed to publishing the
book. I agree that the market will be small but otherwise the book
would be lost completely, as nobody else would print it.

Meanwhile, the other book by Harkness that I am reprinting just came
out five minutes ago. It is "The Blue Book and Encyclopedia of Chess".
It will be available sometime later today or tomorrow on Amazon at:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0923891927

The bridge book by Kenneth Harkness is about two weeks away from being
reprinted but I have decided to go forward with it especially since I
have now done all the work. It will be available when it comes out now
at:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0923891943

(Do not go there now because that page is blank at the present time.)

Thank you again for your feedback.

Sam Sloan

In article ,
Martin Ambuhl wrote:
....
You might mention its title, _Invitation to Bridge_. I hope you have
cleared this with the publishers (Simon & Schuster), who date it as
1950. The Library of Congress control number, 50008099, corresponds to
that date. It was neither an important nor "successful and popular" book
at the time it was published. It is even less important now. You may
find a small group of people interested in buying reprints of obscure,
unimportant monographs on bridge, but the number will be very small.

Always the charmer, eh Marty?

(I note downthread that Sam is all obsequious about thanking you for
your reponse. Tip of the hat to him for that - he is every inch the
gentleman.)

On Feb 28, 9:44 am, samsloan wrote:

Our opponents were top level or nearly top level players too.
Remember, this was the Game Room at the University of California at
Berkeley. Some of the other bridge players hanging out in the game
room were Lou Stansby, Bob Hammand, Kyle Larsen and Bill Nudding. I
knew them all.


The book is a reprint. The book was originally published in 1949. It
was a very successful and popular book at the time. That is the reason
I have been asking if it should be reprinted.



Sam Sloan

In 1949 most of those players were too young to be top players.
Don't think Larsen was born yet.