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Lucky Devils

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What to expect

'There's simply no one better at chronicling the shady, hackable, and wildly anarchic world of gambling' Brad Stone, New York Times bestselling author of The Everything Store and Amazon Unbound

'The best book about gambling I've ever read' Liam Vaughan, author of Flash Crash

'A fascinating insight... Lucky Devils brilliantly reveals what it takes to challenge the seemingly impossible and come out on top' Adam Kucharski, author of The Perfect Bet

'Readers will be thrilled' PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

In the late 1970s, three men declared war on the casino. They arrived in Las Vegas just as the personal computer was beginning its boom. If the power of computers could be applied to gambling, they reasoned, a player could make a mint.

There was only one problem: How do you smuggle a computer, typically, the size of a suitcase, onto a casino floor without getting noticed?

Using cutting-edge strategies and gloriously DIY tech that was decades ahead of its time, they solved this and many other problems. They became pioneers of what's known as advantage playing, applying their intellects and creativity to everything from poker and blackjack to horseracing and roulette. For more than thirty years they faced down angry pit bosses, violent Mafiosos, bankruptcies, nights in foreign jails, lawsuits, and personal betrayals. They learned that the only thing harder than reaching the pinnacle of gambling achievement was staying there.

Drawing from exclusive interviews with all three players and their associates, award-winning Bloomberg journalist Kit Chellel delivers a cinematic and often uproarious account of fortunes gained, lost, and gained again. Scrupulously reported and irresistibly told, Lucky Devils reveals how these players did more than simply amass wealth; they revolutionized the game itself.

They gave the lie to the old adage. The house doesn't always win.

Critics Review

'Lucky Devils is a fabulous book, perfect for the current moment. Readymade for the movies, its tale of the brilliant eccentrics who outsmarted the system offers vicarious thrills of the most satisfying kind, especially as dealt by the dexterous hands of Kit Chellel, whose prose is as kinetic as a ball on a roulette wheel. You can't keep your eyes off it.'
New York Times bestselling author of Madhouse at the End of the Earth
'Ever wonder what it's like to make your fortune as a winning gambler? Lucky Devils takes you there.'
best-selling author of Beat The Dealer and A Man for All Markets
'Cheating at poker and other gambling games has been around forever, but this diabolically entertaining new book brings us up to the minute-to the nanosecond, even.  In highbrow streetwise prose, Chellel reveals how the cunning designers of AI-powered algorithms threaten to make normal human betting decisions quaintly passé.'
New York Bestselling Author of Positively Fifth Street and Cowboys Full: The Story of Poker
'A fascinating insight into the audacious, obsessive world of those who have used science to beat the house. Kit Chellel has uncovered astonishing stories about the luckiest people you've never heard of. From home-made computers to billion-dollar winnings, Lucky Devils brilliantly reveals what it takes to challenge the seemingly impossible and come out on top.'
author of The Perfect Bet
'No one writes about gambling like Kit Chellel. Lucky Devils tells the story of three legendary advantage players, brilliant outsiders who devoted their lives and talents to disproving the adage that the house always wins. At turns insightful, hilarious and surprisingly moving, it's a stone-cold classic. The best book about gambling I've ever read.'
author of Flash Crash (2020)
'There's simply no one better at chronicling the shady, hackable, and wildly anarchic world of gambling, and with Lucky Devils, Kit Chellel spins what amounts to an exuberant origin story. It'd be a suckers bet not to read this book.'
New York Times bestselling author of The Everything Store and Amazon Unbound
'With its colourful cast and levelheaded look at the arms race between gamblers and casinos, this is an addictive profile of the rule breakers who anticipated gambling's data-driven future. Readers will be thrilled.'
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

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