I have had this book on my shelf for a while, and I slowly made my way through it. It may have been an odd choice for an audiobook to begin with, but ultimately, I was glad to have picked it up in this format.
The four games tackled in this book were Checkers, backgammon, chess, Go, Poker, Scrabble, and Bridge. Each chapter begins with the author's experience of the game, his level of interest in it and the history of the game itself. Then, he progresses to championships and is the reigning champion in the field. The next part of the chapter is the longest section and was the most surprising in some ways because I did not pay as much attention to the blurb to absorb what I might encounter. This is about how computers and AI have become involved in the individual games. What programs were written and how successful they were are some of the details discussed.
I might have stuck with my three-star rating, which was what I had decided on as I was nearing the end, but the end notes swayed my review. The author wraps up with a few notes towards the end that put everything we have heard into context. It provides a reason for the author to have focused on things the way he did.
I am more of a board game person than playing in games with such a strict framework. I also need more of a story to keep me hooked. Despite that, I have dabbled in half of these games, and I could understand the nuances of the discussion in the book.
I would not recommend this to anyone who is disinterested in games or has never played any of the mentioned games. Working knowledge of how competitive spirit would differ in these games is a bonus.
I am glad I gave this book a shot, and I did mull over some of the effort that people put into trying to come up with algorithms for the games themselves.
I received an ARC thanks to NetGalley and the publishers but the review is entirely based on my own listening experience.

Listening to this book made me want to have a game night. It is so interesting learning where games came from and where they are going. I was surprised by the information on computer science, game theory and artificial intelligence.

A couple of the games I wasn't as familiar with so it made those sections a little harder to grab my attention, but I definetly am interested in learning to play the game and then listening again.

Thank you for letting me have the opportunity to listen to this book.

For the seven games in the title of the book (checkers, backgammon, chess, Go, poker, Scrabble, and bridge), Roeder covers the rules, history, and cultural impact of each game.

I listened to the audiobook, and perhaps I would have enjoyed this book more in a physical copy, but I often found my mind wondering. I did learn some interesting tidbits about various games, such as the fact that bridge remains one game where human strategy still fare better than AI. It wasn’t a poorly written book, so if the description intrigues you, don’t let my review stop you from checking it out.

Many thanks to NetGalley for providing me an audio ARC of this book.

I was expecting another entry in the (admittedly engaging!) gender of "history of underappreciated things that actually make us human," but what surprised me (and engaged me) about this book was its unexpected focus on AI and games and how humans have adapted successfully (chess or go) or less so (checkers) to computers gaining great skills at the games. As someone whose career is AI adjacent and fully in machine learning and statistics, games are an interesting space because they are constrained by rules and patterns and usually have good data (which is why a system like Watson can destroy a game like Jeopardy but be an utter failure so far in health care). Roeder does a great job explaining the guts of the computer programs and the ways that they have affected game strategy and culture, but an even better job exploring the people that are/were champions facing a looking machine eclipse of their abilities or the creators of the algorithms with surprisingly diverse outlooks and motivations. Of particular interest was the final chapter on Bridge which does not yet have a computer program that is better than humans, partially because of the complex nautre of communication and bluff in the game and partially because, as Roeder describes it, it is a "dying" game, immensely popular in the 2th century but not much played now (and it's the only game f the 7 I've never personally played). The book doesn't go deep on the history or strategy of the games, but it is very interesting as an examination of the exponential rise of computing power and how it has affected our lives.

Seven Games: A Human History is an engaging history of human development through our (probably) unique ability to enjoy games (not just play) capably examined by Dr. Oliver Roeder. Due out 25th Jan 2022 from W. W. Norton, it's 320 pages and will be available in hardcover, audio, and ebook formats.

I've long been interested in games, gaming, history, psychology, and I'm a professional bionerd in my day job. This book really does represent the confluence of all those interests and is like some sort of Venn diagram bullseye for me. I was fascinated from the first chapter. That being said, the author writes very accessibly and well and this is a book for laypeople interested in games and how they have shaped and sometimes defined human history.

There are plenty of anecdotal stories relayed here: a devoutly religious mathematician who dominated at checkers for decades (with a mysterious Fisher-esque abrupt hiatus in the middle), computer programs and the theorists behind them, a Kiwi ascetic hermit who lives in Malaysia and who, after memorizing the French dictionary, won the French national scrabble championship without the benefit of speaking French. Dr. Roeder relays these stories (and more) with wit and warmth and I really enjoyed reading this book.

The unabridged audiobook version has a run time of 9 hours and 11 minutes and is capably narrated by William Sarris. He has a warm and nuanced voice with a non-intrusive (midwestern?) accent which is perfect for this nonfiction selection. The sound and recording quality and production values are high throughout the recording.

This is an interesting book, full of fun and engaging trivia and actual history and would be a good selection for public or school library acquisition, gift giving, or for games-interested general readers. No previous mathematics knowledge required and no "heavy lifting" involved.

Five stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing an ARC of the audiobook for this title in exchange for an honest review. To be clear, this is the perfect book for a reader like me; someone very much into more then one of the games highlighted in the text (I have been an avid chess player for the better part of my life, as well as loving poker, backgammon and checkers.) In addition, my interest in areas such as computer science, game theory and artificial intelligence were all useful in appreciating this book. Here is my breakdown:

Checkers - Possibly my favorite part of the book. Checkers is a game I've always felt like I should know more about - whenever I've played, I haven't been able to analyze what I was doing or why. The narrative about the very best players in the world and the hunt to solve the game of checkers using computers was absolutely fascinating.

Chess - Strangely, this wasn't a section I enjoyed all that much, despite being by far my favorite game covered. It just felt like a shallow addition to most of what I already knew about the game and its history. I think an average reader will get a lot out of it.

Go - Absolutely fascinating - this is a game I need to learn.

Backgammon - Awesome section - I knew barely anything about the game beyond the basic rules, and felt like I got a lot out of this.

Poker - I had some base knowledge of "solvers", but still really enjoyed this portion of the book.

Scrabble - I really enjoyed this section. The narrative about the world's best player was both hilarious and crazy.

Bridge - What can I say? I really had trouble following along here, as I don't know the rules and have little interest in the game.

On balance, I think readers who enjoy one or more of these games, topics such as game theory, AI, neural networks, algorithms, mathematics, etc. will get a lot out of this.

As it was the audiobook that I reviewed, I do have to say that the narrator William Sarris did a nice job with the narration.

This was fascinating. It was heavy on the ability of computers to play games, with interesting insights on what that means.


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