Bridge - Holiday Gift Books for Intermediate Players Far more bridge books are written for intermediates than for any other level of player. An intermediate knows the basics of the game and wants to become at least one of the better players in his duplicate club. The books that caught my eye in the last year were "Improve Your Play at Trump Contracts" by Ron Klinger (Weidenfeld & Nicolson), "15 Winning Cardplay Techniques" by David Bird and Tim Bourke (Vivisphere) and "One Trick at a Time: How to Start Winning at Bridge" by Jim Jackson, "Getting into the Bidding: A Bridge Toolkit" by Bill Treble and "Clever Plays in the Trump Suit" by David Bird (all Master Point Press). Jackson's book discusses duplicate bridge in its various forms and the tactics necessary for success. The diagramed deal, from the book, exhibits the difference between team play (or Chicago) and pair tournaments scored by match points. South was in two spades after North used a transfer bid. West led the heart ten. Declarer started by counting his potential losers. Since dummy had the long trumps, South looked at that hand and took his own high cards into account. Here he could see five possible losers: two spades, one heart and two clubs. He could anticipate taking at least these eight tricks: three spades, two hearts and three diamonds. In a team game he would have been happy with that. But in a pair event he would have wanted an overtrick, which would probably have been available if East had at least one trump honor. Jackson, who was South at the time, played a low heart from the board and dropped his queen under East's ace to create a second dummy entry. East shifted to the diamond eight. Declarer won in the dummy and ran the spade jack. West took the trick with his king and returned a diamond to East's seven and South's ace. The safest play now was to cash the spade ace. If East had started with queen-third of spades, this would have cost an overtrick. Since East's having queen-third was more likely than three low spades, Jackson crossed to the heart jack and played a spade to his nine. Disaster! West produced the queen and gave his partner a diamond ruff. The defenders then took two club tricks to defeat the contract. Pairs can be a frustrating game at times.