General & Miscellaneous Biography, Gambling

The Odds

Name: The Odds
Author: Chad Millman
ISBN: 9780306811562

by Chad Millman

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Overview

One gambler is a manic former cokehead with an Ivy League degree. The second is a college dropout trying to make a living at the only thing he enjoyed at school—gambling. The third, one of Vegas's most respected bookmakers, is perilously close to burning out. The Odds follows the lives of these three professional gamblers through a college basketball season in a one-of-a-kind city struggling to reconcile its lawless past with its family-friendly makeover. With a wiseguy attitude and a faultless eye and ear for the sights and sounds of Vegas and its denizens, Chad Millman has created a portrait that the Wall Street Journal called "fascinating. . . often screamingly funny." The Las Vegas Review-Journal had just one word for the book: "Superb."

Synopsis

One wild read (Rick Reilly, Sports Illustrated) about a unique city trying to find itselfand about three gamblers who win, lose, and risk everything during the college basketball season

Las Vegas Review-Journal

Superb...a must read.

About the Author, Chad Millman

Chad Millman is a former Sports Illustrated reporter, a CNNSI correspondent, and associate editor at ESPN The Magazine. He has covered the NCAA basketball tournament, the Boston College football gambling scandal, the 1992 and 1996 Summer Olympics, and six Super Bowls. He lives in New York City.

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Editorials

Sports Illustrated

An intimate, hilarious and, at times, sad portrait of...(sports betting) in Sin City.

Wall Street Journal

fascinating. . . a print version of cinema-verite. Its foul-mouthed dialogue seems all too authentic . . . screamingly funny

Las Vegas Review-Journal

Superb...a must read.

Las Vegas Sun

Thoroughly reported and tightly written...splendid.

Library Journal

To some, sports betting is good clean fun it adds spice to the game to put a little down on your alma mater. To others, it's big business federal agents estimated that before the 2000 Super Bowl that nearly $5 billion would be bet both legally and illegally, and the 2000 NCAA basketball tournament drew nearly $80 million in legal Nevada bets and estimates running from $2.5 to $7 billion in illegal action. Here, sports reporter Chad Millman goes to Las Vegas, the legal gambling mecca threatened by recent legislation and offshore Internet betting sites, and follows the men who make the odds and those who try to beat them. This is not a Reefer Madness-style expos designed to scare gamblers straight, but its depiction of the lives of a young bookmaker, a big player, and a rookie gambling professional still might make bettors consider dialing 1-800-BETS-OFF. Recommended for larger public libraries. Jim Burns, Ottumwa P.L., IA Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Booknews

Millman's close-up of three gamblers in Las Vegas to bet on the 1999 college basketball "final four" playoffs provides a harrowing view of gambling addiction even as he relates the concern of the gamblers and their bookmakers that their way of life is being threatened as Las Vegas becomes more family friendly. Millman is an associate editor at . Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)