American Roulette: How I Turned the Odds Upside Down—My Wild Twenty-Five-Year Ride Ripping Off the World’s Casinos by Richard Marcus
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I wonder how much the gambling layperson will enjoy reading American Roulette? The book recounts the casino cheating career of “Richard Marcus”, who was a past posting casino cheat. Marcus masters the art of past posting roulette and sometimes blackjack. Along with his team, he sets up pit bosses and dealers, by switching higher denomination chips under winning bets. Eventually the team uses a reverse past post, where the big bet is taken away instead of being added. The reverse past post greatly reduced security heat and increased the team’s win rate.
For gamblers, the book provides a fairly detailed explanation of various casino cheating techniques. Although, I would have enjoyed learning more about how the team laundered their winnings, and more about their money management strategies.
The book is divided into chronological chapters where different eras of Marcus’ cheating are recounted. The most interesting part of the book for the student of casino history is the chapters that outline the development of the Classon gang. This chapter tells the story of a grizzly old gambler from New York named Mumbles who begins past posting craps in San Juan, and who eventually moves to Las Vegas to perfect his “lay and claim” technique.
Overall, I enjoyed reading this book. It’s well written (I assume “Richard Marcus” is a pseudonym, and the book is ghost written) and the stories are suspenseful and generally exciting. In order to win a living as a casino cheat, one must have nothing to lose. Although little is said about the author’s childhood, I assume it was pretty rough, and his family relationships are pretty bad. If you have anything to lose, read this book after work, but show up the next day to your job on time 🙂
