Bridge - Holiday Gift Books for Players - NYTimes.com Christmas decorations are already up in many stores, and perhaps your thoughts are turning to gifts. Presumably at least one bridge player is on your list. Over the next four columns let's look at books aimed at various levels of expertise, starting with near beginners. Two published this year were "Boehm's Card Play Essentials" by August W. Boehm (A. L. Ayers Printing) and "A First Book of Bridge Problems" by Patrick O'Connor (Master Point Press). Boehm's book covers the basic elements of declarer play and defense in 56 pages. The author, who plays a lot of bridge in Manhattan and is also a concert pianist, has nine chapters, a short concluding quiz and a glossary. Interestingly, there is also "Trick Fourteen - Building Memory," a page and a half based partly on "Secrets of a Mind-Gamer" by Joshua Foer, an article that appeared in The New York Times Magazine in 2011. O'Connor's book contains 50 card-play problems. After the reader has worked out his answer, he turns the page to see the full deal and review O'Connor's analysis. The diagramed deal is from Boehm's book. South has the task of making four spades. West leads a low diamond. Declarer calls for dummy's jack (West won't be leading away from the ace), but East wins with his queen and cashes the ace. Then East shifts to the club deuce. South tries his queen, but West produces the king and returns the club three (lowest of three remaining cards). How should declarer continue after taking East's jack with his ace? The book contains no auctions. The given sequence follows two-over-one game-force, with North's three-spade raise being forcing. South continues to four spades to indicate a minimum. In Standard, North would raise two spades to four spades. To eliminate his remaining club loser, South has to establish dummy's heart suit. Since the suit is breaking 4-2, declarer must ruff two hearts in his hand and therefore needs three dummy entries: two for the ruffs and one to reach the last heart. These entries must be one high heart, the spade ace and the spade ten. So South cashes his spade king, then turns to hearts, taking dummy's two winners and ruffing a low heart with a high trump (so that West cannot overruff). Declarer plays the spade three to dummy's ten, ruffs another heart, returns to dummy with a trump (simultaneously removing West's last spade) and cashes the last heart, on which he discards his club four. Some Master Point Press books, available from the publisher, are also purchasable in electronic editions. Books and other bridge products can also be ordered from Baron Barclay Bridge Supply and the magazine The Bridge World.