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Hats & Eyeglasses: A Family Love Affair with Gambling | 
 enlarge | Author: Martha Frankel
Publisher: Tarcher
Category: Book
List Price: $23.95
Buy New: $5.99
You Save: $17.96 (75%)
New (32) Used (15) Collectible (1) from $5.99
Avg. Customer Rating:  25 reviews
Sales Rank: 106341
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 240
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.8
ISBN: 1585425583
Dewey Decimal Number: 363.42092
EAN: 9781585425587
ASIN: 1585425583
Publication Date: February 14, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
A gloriously written memoir of growing up in a family of hard- core gamblers-Martha Frankel thought the gambling gene had passed her by, until she found herself addicted to online poker and knee-deep in debt.
Most weekends when Martha Frankel was a kid, her mother had a mah-jongg game going in the kitchen with her girlfriends while their husbands were in the living room playing poker. Once Frankel reached adulthood, however, while her cousins were making their way in the world as bookies and drug dealers, gambling didn't much factor into her life.
In the tradition of Five-Finger Discount by Helene Stapinski and Dry by Augusten Burroughs, Hats & Eyeglasses traces Frankel's love affair with poker. It was a passion that bit her in her mid-forties and remained harmless enough when she stuck to real cards. But everything changed one evening in 1998 in Atlantic City, when Frankel overheard one dealer bemoan the fact that his tips that evening were going to be small what with the meager crowd assembled. Another dealer mentioned that everyone must be playing online-"Why leave the house when you can play in your pajamas?" the dealer said. Why indeed? thought Frankel, who couldn't wait to get back to her computer. The next morning she took a deep breath, typed in her credit card number, and entered the world of online gambling. It was the beginning of what one of her uncles called "hats and eyeglasses," a term used to describe those times when you're losing so bad you're drowning (so all one can see is the poker player's hat and eyeglasses floating on the surface of the water). By turns hilarious and heartbreaking, Hats & Eyeglasses is a tale of passion, addiction-and those times in life when we almost lose our shirt.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 20 more reviews...
A beautiful read May 2, 2008
This is a beautifully written story about a gambling addiction, and yet it is so much more than that. This is about a woman who loves her family and her life, and you can't help but love them too. I enjoyed all the details about growing up in Queens. It brought back so many memories. And I also loved all the details about playing poker. A lovely book.
Amazing book! April 25, 2008
This book is brilliant. Not only is it a great, simulataneously heart-wrenching and hilarious story about gambling, it is a fantastic family history. At the same time you fall in love with Frankel, you'll want to hang out with all her relatives and play poker with her for hours. I highly recommend it!
Hat's off to HATS AND EYEGLASSES April 12, 2008
A touching life story which entertains and educates. Easy to read, I am passing my copy on to family and friends, who are currently working to reconcile a loved family members' secret, addictive and finally criminal life from gambling.
I loved it from beginning to end! April 7, 2008
Hats and Eyeglasses captivated me from beginning to end. Martha Frankel's description of her childhood, filled with lots of loving "aunts" and "uncles," is hilarious. Frankel brings humor to gambling addiction, a subject that all to many of us deal with in our families. She exposes her addiction and recovery in a way that makes us hopeful.
I couldn't put the book down. After finishing it I handed it to my husband, who read it just as quickly.
A Five Star Read April 1, 2008
A warm, witty and insightful memoir of a family and poker playing. I couldn't put it down. The three themes of, the gambling family, poker with the guys, and descent into on-line poker hell, are woven together with humor, charm and honesty. As a life-long poker player who has been part of long running games with the same people, I will tell you that Martha brings it to life on the page. The camaraderie, laughter, anger, and the drama, replete with heroes and scoundrels, is described in detail and emotion that I know to be dead-on. I laughed and I cried. I doff my hat, and my eyeglasses too!
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