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25 February 2006

Metachat Book Club nominations for March, anyone? Nominations close and voting opens Monday morning. (Sorry bout Feb.)
Jamie O'Neill: At Swim, Two Boys
posted by rebirtha 25 February | 14:17
Spin (i just finished it--really good, recommended by Hayden and others online), or American Gods, which Randall got for me from my wishlist just yesterday.
posted by amberglow 25 February | 14:18
Ah, I've read American Gods already (it is good though)

How about something by John Le Carre? I just started reading Absolute Friends, and since a movie based on one of his books is up for a few Oscars (The Constant Gardner) it'll be sorta timely.
posted by kosher_jenny 25 February | 14:39
Is non-fiction allowed?
posted by orthogonality 25 February | 15:06
If nonfiction, I'm reading Annals of the Former World, Life's Devices, and The Fate of Africa.
posted by kmellis 25 February | 15:13
If nonfiction, I'm reading Annals of the Former World


John Mcphee+++. Every time he writes about a place, I find myself wanting to go there.

Pine Barrens
is the shit. (And a hell of a lot shorter than Annals.

Oh, wait. You were making a "long books" joke, weren't you?
posted by dersins 25 February | 15:27
if non-fiction, i vote The Cheese and the Worms
posted by amberglow 25 February | 15:32
or something weightier, like this (which i've wanted to read for a while: A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia/Deleuze & Guattari
posted by amberglow 25 February | 15:49
What was that book about the MIT students gambling in Las Vegas that was recommended in the earlier thread? Too lazy to research.
posted by matildaben 25 February | 16:44
One nomination a piece, please. Fiction OR non-, I don't care. But I can't keep track of your nominations as they are.

Please remember, you are nominating a book you want to read, not that you have already read. Also, nothing not available in paperback at present. And please provide a link to the book+description (truncate the referrer crap if using Amazon.com).

So, Take 2. Please post your FINAL nominations below.
posted by Eideteker 25 February | 16:46
Previous nominations 1* 2.

*Rules are here.

No book gets an auto-nomination this month because there were only four votes last time.
posted by Eideteker 25 February | 16:51
"Oh, wait. You were making a "long books" joke, weren't you?"

Nope.
posted by kmellis 25 February | 17:14
Jamie O'Neill: At Swim, Two Boys
posted by rebirtha 25 February | 21:02
The first book about clocking (detecting statistical bias by long observation) roulette was Alan N. Wilson's The Casino Gambler's Guide. He was a CalTech student. The recent exploit by MIT students essentially duplicated Wilson's methods. Wilson also anticipated Thorp's card counting at blackjack, but could not extend his results sufficiently to operationalize it.

Thorp is the guy for mathematical analysis of gambling. He also invented arbitraging, hedge funds and a host of other wonderful things.

The Eudaemonic Pie by Thomas A. Bass describe the birth of the Santa Cruz school of dynamic systems (aka chaos) theory and the efforts to beat roulette by operationalizing a method developed by Ed Thorp and Claude Shannon for using very accurate stopwatches to predict and bet in the brief time between when the ball is thrown and the betting is closed (only allowed in American casinos.)
posted by warbaby 27 February | 19:12
I'm Going Home || This is a whining thread!

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