Bringing Down the House : The Inside Story of Six MIT Students Who Took Vegas for Millions by Ben Mezrich Search Amazon for other books by or about Ben Mezrich. Rating: Reviewed by: Kevin Bouchard

This story spawned from the book's main character, Kevin Lewis, meeting the author in Boston one night and stating "I've got a great story for your next book." The premise of the story is how Kevin Lewis was recruited, trained, and participated on the MIT Blackjack Team in efforts to fleece the casino industry of as much money as humanly possible. The irony is that the MIT Blackjack Team won millions from Vegas playing blackjack legally.

Mezrich wrote a narrative of Ken Lewis's last few years from Lewis's perspective, reading more like fiction than a straight biography. The author documented the transformation of Lewis and his counterparts from bright MIT college students into international playboys with unlimited funds, contacts and cash.

The personality of Lewis is at first troubled by the numerous ethical and moral dilemmas of counting cards and other elaborate group schemes derived by the MIT Blackjack Team destined to bring the casinos to their knees. Lewis states "So you guys cheat at cards?" and one of his mentors retorts "Absolutely not. We don't alter any of the rules…We use our brains to take advantage of arbitrage opportunities. Blackjack is beatable- so we beat it. We beat the hell out of it." Usually, there was too much money for Lewis to resist the urge.

Lewis transformed on the Vegas weekends into a number of his elaborate aliases for the weekends of hubris, greed, vanity and gluttony. The double life of Kevin Lewis as a college student and MIT gambling member was simply rationalized by risk and profitability. He worked during the week like everyone else, yet traveled to Vegas most weekends for the challenge of beating the casinos and reaping huge personal profits.

Ben Mezrich could have named this book Greed Is Good, taken from the almost prophetic words of Charlie Sheen's character in the 1987 movie Wall Street. However as the limelight of the winnings faded after continued weekend trips to Vegas, Kevin Lewis learned that despite the clear and present danger, the casino companies tended to flex their muscles after they realized that they been taken advantage of time and time again.

The book was a quick read after the author finishes a slower background story in the beginning chapters of the book. Clearly this was not written to teach readers how to cheat and win at blackjack in Vegas; however Mezrich does give some hope to people going to Vegas that they may indeed have a chance to change their life with the potential for big winnings. Good luck.