Chess Books

After I have seen this book I must say that it is a "must" that anyone should have. It is shameful that somebody that wants to become the undisputed world champion, tries to win it by means that do not belong to the sport. To accuse someone and to have no proof at all of anything, it is only show of seomone who is not capable of getting anything via normal ways.
Definitely Kramnik won "EVERY SINGLE POINT" on the chess board. I have seen the San Luis 2005 book, and I would say, that yes it might have some points in which Topalov could have worked on his own before computers were well developed. But, to try to win a WCC match by no sportive means. That's something else!. NO EXCUSE for that!!!
I really like the book!

From London to Elista: The Inside Story of the World Chess Championship Matches That Vladimir Kramnik Won Against Garry Kasparov, Peter Leko and Vesilin Topalov I found the book to read easily and the material with analysis is very strong.

If you are a typical chess amateur like me who loves to read chess books more for the anecdotes, and sort of wishes that the games and analysis would somehow automatically permeate through to my consciousness, then you will love this book.

The stories and accounts are fascinating, Ilya Luvitov in particular asks some very sharp and direct questions and this brings out the best of Bareev. And snippets in between from thoughts of Kramnik and Lautier and the occassional quip from an Kasparov interview keep making the book more colorful.

The games are full of diagrams and there is both sufficient text commentary that you dont need to setup a board and also there is enough analysis to keep one busy if one did get the pieces out !

A book not to be missed, unique amongst all chess books in the way it captures the very heart of the human element of competitive endeavour.

First I want to clarify and say that this book deserves its good reputation, and its high selling volume since it first came out is justified. One can enjoy penetrating into thinking process of the skilled chess professionals who had been interviewed from the Kramnik camp, as well as read excripts from the other GMs cited from different sources.
Sheer amount of psychology involved into pre-game preparation is puzzling, and drive one to continuously read it. Concreatly, I was more interested into reading details of pre-game preparation process and post-mortem reactions, than of analysis of the games played. Fortunatelly, analysis material of the games is significantly lighter that that of the "San Luis 2005" book, but still it wouldnt mind if some more textual explanation had been added into it, especially at late opening phase mortals nowdays are hard to grasp.
From historical perspective this is the book to have on your chess shelf to cover world championship matches starting from 2000 and leading to final unification match in 2006.
Recommended.

Sharon's first book speaks to the excitement and joy grandparents feel when expecting a grandchild. It will help remind those precious little ones how much they are loved. The simple text is written in both English and Spanish - a wonderful way to help introduce both languages to a grandchild.

Grandma's Ready / La Abuelita Ya Esta Lista is a bilingual English/Spanish softcover picturebook about a mother who is about to become a new grandmother. Such a momentous forthcoming event requires preparation - what does an impending grandmother have to do to get ready? "Find the old toys and clean them like new. / Your mom and dad used them when they were small too. / A special place for when it's time to sleep. / And a space for when you start to creep." Simple illustrations colored in a style reminiscent of crayon add a playful touch to this picturebook ideal for reading aloud in either (or both) languages.

When my husband and I wanted to tell our family that we were pregnant, we wanted to do it in a way that would be remembered. Therefore, we went searching for books that were about children and their various relatives. Grandma's Ready was a great find. We enjoyed the illustrations; the story line reminds us of the days we spent with our grandparents. It was also nice that the story and illustrations are bilingual and multicultural. I am hoping that the author will continue with a possible series, which may include grandpas, aunts, and uncles.

This is a wonderful book from first time author Sharon Chess. The story and illustrations are beautiful. It's a great gift idea for a soon to be Grandma. Will be a treasured story that will be passed on from grandchild to grandchild. Found it very interesting that it was in English and Spanish on each page. For a multilingual family this is a great idea. Why don't more authors do this? Highly recommended.

This book belongs in every chesslover's library. The combinations and strategies are suberb. This and "The Immortal Games of Capablanca" are, IMHO, two of the finest books in chess literature. And both are by the same author

This is a great book.The games are fantastic,the analysis good and the short introductions to each game are fascinating.The only drawback is the descriptive notation,but the book is too good to miss.

This is really a book of chess traps showing you entire short games. Nice to learn how to handle tactics in opening play and get a little introduction to some of the openings. This is a good book for the advanced beginner through in-the-middle level player to learn from and learn the traps. I have always enjoyed books on opening chess traps and short games! This one is one of the better ones. Perhaps a little out dated in the openings used at the time the book was written but this does little to detract from the real value of the book - opening traps and tactics!

80 highly tactical games, with venues and players named, annotated for the beginner.

This is what chess is all about! Amazing games. Glorious conclusions. A couple end in remarkable draws. Most finish with the inevitable threat of checkmate.

FEATURES

+ Digestible format. Each game looks like its own chapter, though it's only 2-3 pages. The brevity of the comments, the lightness of the annotations, and the shortness of the games all conspire to induce even a rank beginner into taking a bite. It's very easy to play out a single game when you find yourself with a few minutes to spare.

+ Breadth of coverage. Although this book is no-one's first choice for studying the openings, it certainly provides a convenient introduction. The games are grouped by opening, roughly in the order of their chronological popularity. The first half is dominated by open games, especially the King's Gambit and Ruy Lopez. In the middle, there are several of the French, the Sicilian, the Caro-Kann, and the Queen's Gambit. Finally, there are samples of modern openings, like the KID and English. There is no index; there wouldn't be a point.

+ Reinfeld's descriptions. They're brief, but they make the games interesting. He tells you what to watch for in plain English.

+ Useful, brief, understandable annotations. Typical chess annotations are of the form "instead of this move, which leads to this series of moves" and end with a position that is not obviously winning for either side. These are inscrutable to beginners. Reinfeld, however, only provides that sort of annotation when the result is decisive. Often, he instead lists the threats. In other words, he tells us what would happen if the next player skipped his turn. This is exactly what the beginner wants to know. He can think for a minute, "OK. So how would I counter that threat?" Then he can see the next move and understand why it was made.

DRAWBACKS?

OK. There are many ways to criticize this book. For example:

"Many of these games are against duffers!"
A: Yes, and often the master is hampered by considerable disadvantages (a blindfold, a simultaneous exhibition, a piece removed before the game even starts, or a free move for the opponent) which tend to level the playing field. Because the games are not nail-bitingly close, a beginner can understand the moves.

"There are too many mistakes in these games."
A: It is very useful to the beginner to see how to take advantage of mistakes. Most here are subtle, rather than outright blunders like leaving a piece en prise (attacked and undefended), but Reinfeld's verbal explanations are clear and cogent. Sometimes there is an obvious mistake, but only when the position is already lost.

"These games are all available elsewhere, in books and computer databases."
A: Yes, because they are classics. If they were lengthy struggles, I might recommend a computer or deep annotations, but not for such decisive games. Just watch and learn.

"The moves are in Descriptive Notation."
A: This is really not a problem when the analysis is so shallow. DN is fine for re-playing games (as well as for tactics puzzles, where NxN is actually easier to grasp than Nxf3). Don't be dissuaded by this.

"There is only 1 diagram per game. A beginner book should not require a board."
A: For one of these quick games, one diagram is almost too much. It mainly serves to remind you that you are reading a chess book! Well, it also reassures the beginner that he is following the moves correctly. Yes, this book requires a board. I enjoy moving the pieces and imagining that I am one of the great masters. I peek at the end to see which side wins, and I play his pieces, trying to guess the moves.

"It's very difficult to guess the master's move following a diagram."
A: True. Since the strong moves which follow the diagrams are far from obvious, this book is not useful for tactical drills. The purpose is to inspire. However, it is possible to look for the crushing blow near the end.

TRUST ME!

With these objections swept aside, there is much to love in this treasure trove. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. Once you know the rules and have lost a few games, you are ready for this book, and I hope you enjoy it as much as I have.

A great book on computer chess from two of the field's pioneers.

This excellent book was and still is one of the state-of-the-art books in computer chess literature, dealing with both a very interesting history of computer chess, including many rare examples of the play of early programs, and several recent examples of the best actual programs, as well as discussing in sufficient detail the quite complex technical aspects of programming a computer to play chess.

In "The Challenge Is World Champion Kasparov", we are introduced to one of the first encounters between Garry Kasparov and the former incarnation of Deep Blue, then called Deep Thought, through the detailed discussion of the proceedings and analysis of both games. A game between Karpov and Deep Thought is also carefully analyzed.

Next, "The Early Ideas" present historically the pioneer works of Shannon, Turing, Zuse, and many others, whose theorical works provided the basement for writing procedures to allow a machine to play chess.

Then, in "The First Working Programs", we see Bernstein, Kotok, McCarthy, and other AI specialist, as they struggled to implement Shannon's ideas to make Jurassic computers play some passable chess. Several games between both computers and humans are discussed.

After these preliminary attemps, "The Formative Years" discusses more advanced programs, such as Greenblatt's MacHack VI program, Botvinnik's Pioneer, and specially Slate & Atkin's Chess program and soviet Kaissa, focusing both on the internal of the programs and on relevant sample games.

The following chapter, "The Challenges for the Levy Bet", tells us all the details of the famous Levy bet, nicely commented by co-author David Levy himself. The best games between him and Chess are commented, as well as a particularly beautiful miniature of Blitz against Belle.

As the field advances, "The Computer Becomes a Master" discusses the ever increasing achievements of the new generation of stronger hardware-assisted chess programs, such as Belle (written by Ken Thompson, who also has developed many Endgame Databases) and Cray Blitz (written by Bob Hyatt, who is also the author of Crafty, a strong freeware chess program), which use their incredibly fast underlying hardware to compensate for their lack of chess sophistication. We can also read all about how the first International human Masters began to know defeat against them on a regular basis.

The next step, the defeat of strong human Grandmasters, is introduced in "Eyeball to Eyeball with Grandmasters", where we see several commented games between the strongest chess programs, such as Deep Thought and Hitech, and human grandmasters such as Miles and Larsen. Also, microprocessor commercial chess program Mephisto has a close encounter of the 3rd kind against macroprocessor non-commercial Deep Thought, and far from ashamed, beats him hands down !

Once those historical details have been dealt with, the book enters into a discussion of the more advanced chess techniques there are, such as "Endgame Play and Endgame Databases", an area pioneered by Ken Thompson's Belle, where computers have conquered new grounds, and become invincible players. The development of a K+R vs K database is discussed in detail enough to allow anyone to program it, and then both games of the mini-match between grandmaster Walter Browne and Belle, the former trying to mate the computer with K+Q against K+R, are commented in detail.

A very technical chapter follows, "Search Techniques Used by Chess Programs", where the most advanced techniques are explained, such as Minimaxing, Alpha-Beta prunning, Iterative Deepening, and a large, detailed, and complete explanation of Hash tables, with many diagrams and examples, to make it crystal clear. Other aspects such as Time management, Evaluation functions, Move generation, etc. are thoroughly discussed as well.

The next chapter, "The Evolution of Computing Systems for Chess Programs", explains what lies ahead: faster processors, chess-specific hardware, multiprocessors, and makes dire predictions on the increment of playing strength all these advances will bring.

Once these almost unearthly machines have been shown, it is the time for down-to-earth-ones, the ones everyone can buy, and "Commecially Available Chess Computers and Software" introduces them all, from the primitive, very early Chess Challenger, to Mephisto Almeria announcing mate in 7 to a 2350 ELO player under tournament conditions.

On "Writing a Chess Program" gives a concise advice on how to write a chess program oneself, and by way of comparison shows a table with the ELO rating of the best chess programs as compared to that of their programmers and more chess-profficient technical advisors.

Finally, closing the book with a gem, "Stop Press" shows commercial program Mephisto Portoroz defeating former World Champion Anatoli Karpov during a simultaneous exhibition. That such a machine, which anyone could buy, without any special ultrafast hardware, can defend successfully against as superb a grandmaster as Karpov, says much about how far computer chess has progressed.

The book closes with an extensive bibliography given in "Additional Reading", and some information on the ICCA, given in "Appendix A: The International Computer Chess Association", and a table with complementary data in "Appendix B: Results of Major Tournaments".

If you like to program computers and you love chess then "How Computers Play Chess" is for you. This easy to read and intuitive book by Chess Master David Levy takes you on a tour guide of man's attempt to create a machine that can master that ancient game of strategy, Chess. You'll gain an introductory view of how computers go about playing the game of chess including the types the algorithms that are used and the general theorys behind these "thinking machines". Levy also introduces some of his own thoughts on the strenghts of computer chess and even includes a few pradictions on when a computer will be able to defeat a human world champion. I read this book in an attemp to satisfy a life long desire I've had to create a computer program that could be me in chess. I've found that this book as gotten me off to an excellent start

This book is a definitive history of computers and chess up through Deep Thought in 1990. Largely a survey, it rarely takes a strong point of view of its own. For someone looking for such a history, or for a basic consideration of chess algorithms from alpha-beta pruning through hash tables, killer move tables, and quiesence, it is a fine book. For my money, though, it did not go into enough depth either in technical issues such as the details of even a simple evaluation function or move generator, or in the philosophical issues raised by computer chess.

El libro muestra con suficiente claridad el estilo de cada uno de los GM que analiza, así como partidas de un alto contenido didactico; queda uno con la motivación de saber aun más de los grandes ajedrecistas de todas las épocas; el libro es especialmente util para el jugador de club que quiere conocer de forma amena la evolución de la teoria ajedrecista; la sección de Morphy y Rubinstein son particularmente interesantes; el libro tiene una excelente presentación y su formato es igualmente bueno.

This book is a must have on chess history. It is a little pricey but the content is trememdous. If you are new or old to chess this book is for you. I never tire from the great games the masters have played. This book is seldom in print but if you can get it snatch it UP. You won't be disappointed.

this book offer a good oportunity to admire and understand the style of the great chessplayers of all times. The section about Labourdonnais is excelent, his games against Mcdonnell are littles gems. The game Pillsbury-Tarrasch show how a GM break good defence; in general is a terrific book, good for club players to pro's whith very good explanations.

This book is fun to read. And unlike an ordinary chessbook, this is one you actually READ, as opposed to study. The ratio of words to game annotations is unusually high.

What's really great about the book is the number of relatively obscure players who receive attention. Fischer, Lasker, and Steinitz receive the most, but 45 other players get their own separate sections, in addition to the Italian School theorists and the 7 Pleiades of Germany.

Paulsen gets a much-deserved section as a player far ahead of his time and typically overlooked in chess history. Writes Fauber, "The tragegy of Paulsen is that only the players who went beyond his successors ever understood him. His play has such a contemporary feel that it is hard to appreciate what a true pioneer he was."

The two noteworthy omissions, Bronstein and Tal, are perhaps forgivable, if not laudable, for those players have popular, excellent, and readily available autobiographies. (Sorceror's Apprentice & Life and Games of Mikhail Tal.) However, there are no GAMES of Bronstein's, and only a non-tactical loss for Tal.

There are many players mentioned in passing, and though there are no post-Fischer games, there is at least a chapter discussing the three K's, plus Polgar, up-and-comers, and the damned computer itself.

With this coverage, Fauber dovetails nicely with Saidy's March of Chess Ideas, which concentrates on mid to late 20th century players and has full chapters on both Tal and Bronstein. Also, Saidy goes into more depth on the smaller number of players covered. I recommend buying BOTH books, if you can find them.

Euwe's Development of Chess Style, which concentrates on playing style rather than on biography, provides an interesting comparison. You would not regret purchasing all 3 books.

Back to Fauber.... There is a complete index of players and their opponents. There is also an index of openings, which serves mainly to demonstrate the wide coverage of the book as the annotations are not thorough enough to make this a useful treatise on openings. (Get Dumont's 500 Master Games if that's what you want.)

There are over 200 games, many well-known. I did not find the annotations particularly enlightening, aside from the simple threats mentioned in many of the games of the first half of the book, and I doubt that a stronger player would see much value in them either. But the primary aim, according to Fauber in his introduction, is not instruction, but rather, "to spotlight the major players and their contributions to chess. Games have been included that attempt to portray the style, [and] the personal touch which goes with the greatness, of the players. Sometimes, though, a game has found entrance because it is pretty, and the readers will enjoy it. That is the ultimate aim of this book, to offer some evenings of enjoyment exploring the rich past which chess bequeaths to all of us."

He succeeds in this aim: A chess book for all fans, weak or strong. But sadly out of print.

For decades, A. Karpov has been the world leading expert and supporter (both in theoretical discusion and practical results) of this very solid defence. This book is focused in the sharp advance and gambit lines (ECO B10-B12) and accomplishes the task of pointing out the best continuations and ideas for both sides in a wonderful way. Either you like to defend the resourceful positions arising from this defence or to crack it, this book will help you to choose the best way to do it. The variations follow a prelation order helping the reader to identify them from bad or dubious to recommended ones.

Overall, an excellent book which surpasses the good old work from V. Kotronias on the same subject.

If John Watson and David Bronstein were to write one on the Caro Advance, this would be it, except it's Anatoly Karpov, and Mikhail Podgets, of wich the latter is probably responsible for the lucid, insightful, and highly entertaining prose comments. Jimmy Adams was the translator. Coverage is balanced and exceptionally comprehensive, presented in a tree style. There are detailed tree indexes for every chapter, but it lacks an index for the hundreds of embedded games, just giving listings for the dozen plus illustrative games added on at the end. That's about the only flaw I see. The volume assumes some acquaintance with the main variations, but is probably accesible to anyone who's gone through Starting Out: Caro Kann or something similar. Anyone from A or B class through GM should find it more than useful.

I just recieved this book in the mail and wanted to throw out a quick review of the publishing job and some of the content. I really think this is how an opening book should be made. Very easy to read and follow, multiple indices, an average of about 2 diagrams per page for 260 pages. The prose is conversational and direct. This book looks to be an excellent resourse for both black and white players who want to enter these variations. About 230 of the 260 pages cover the Advance system. I eagerly await the next volume, and I don't even currently use the C-K defense. This looks to be one of the best opening books I've seen. Very clean, professional. Buy it if you are at all interested in the Caro-Kann.

This is a great book. This is not a repertory book but a reference book. I found every variation I was interested to learn. I would say that this book is for people +1900 and for seasoned Caro Kann players. This is not a good book for starting to play the Caro.
There is something I did not like about this book... it is very hard to follow the variations. You have to be patient to find your way thru pages and lots of variations and sub variations.
If you already play the Caro, you are +1900 and have a lot of time to follow thru hundreds of variations then this is the book for you.
If you want to learn to play the Caro and want to learn the structure and plans look somewhere else.

J.H. Donner was a chess journalist and Grandmaster from the Netherlands. This book assembles some of his best articles from his 30 year writing career. From the standpoint of reporting and history, you will get accounts of the author's contacts with Fischer, Spassky, Botvinnik, Petrosian, Bronstein, and other greats from that generation --that alone would have been worth the price. But in addition, what emerges is not only a portrait of Donner the man (and he was a character!), but also his fascinating commentary on the human condition. His provocative article on why women can't play chess seems at first to be the rantings of some benighted chauvinist pig, then you see that it is really a tongue-in-cheek tribute to women, and by the end you realize it is something else altogether. Donner has a great feel for irony, a gift for constructing delicious insults, and a sideways approach to his subjects that simply confounds expectations. You won't learn any opening theory, or build your tactical skills, but you will laugh and be entertained. Send more stars!

Donner was Denmark's strongest player since Euwe and a prolific chess journalist. In this collection of essays about chess, Donner claims (among other things) that "the fact is, women are much stupider than men", that "no Dutch can achieve anything worthwhile", and Ree is such a weak chess player he bet he would win the match with him at 150-to-1 odds. Of course, that doesn't for one minute stop him from praises Nona Gaprindashvili's victory in Lone Pine, 1977, worshipping Euwe, and being on friendly terms with Ree-including praising him honestly when he (Ree) won the match.

Donner's "hatereds" are not to be taken too seriously: he is not a megalomaniacal bigot, he merely plays one in his columns (e.g., when he pretends to be deeply insulted that Fischer's famous "10 best players of all time" list somehow didn't mention him.) But *pretending* to be a bigoted know-it-all is wonderful literary excuse for Donner to write about all the "really important" things about tournament X or grandmaster Y--that is, whatever *he* felt like writing about them--and to hell with convention, or with what his employers wanted. After all, if all those inferior people (such as his bosses at the paper, who might even be Dutch and/or women) complain that his reporting is obscure or odd, what's that to Donner?

The result is that Donner's chess essays were like nobody else's--a flight of fancy that takes one to totally unexpected placed. For example, when reporting about a Cuban tournament he participated in, it's much better, in Donner's view, to report, how a bridge hand he played with a few other chess players turned out (while insulting the other players as hopeless bridge bumblers) than to bother with boring stuff, like the tournament's results or other unimportant trivia. While driving his editors in the paper to distraction, Donner's journey is so much fun you simply don't mind that you don't get the crosstable. It is a guided tour of chess as seen by a fanatical, but very funny, eccentric who loves the game waaaaaaaaay too much. They have a sense of tragic dignity to them: those of a man well aware of the absurdity of grown men trying to make a living at what is, essentially, a game--and failing, often due to the petty actions of organizers who cannot play the game themselves.

There is nothing quite like this book. You'll probably love it; you may hate it; but it won't leave you unmoved.

This book stands out of competition. I have read many chess books, but this one is certainly the most entertaining book of all. It is a combination of chess and literature. This compilation of chess articles Donner wrote for several magazines, is full of witty chess anecdotes. Donner writes in his incomparable style, and I am sure that the English translation cannot render the exact content of the Dutch text (I have read in Dutch and it is beautiful Dutch). But since this book in Dutch is worth at least six stars, in English it deserves beyond any doubt five stars.

This is a fun book to read about chess and some of the stories of the lives of grandmasters. A good read.

There are several reasons to recommend this primer.

1) - it teaches basic moves in a straightforward fashion
2) - it requires no prior knowledge of chess from the reader
3) - it presents the material very logically, step by step
4) - it covers basic strategy and has helpful general advice
5) - it is published by gambit (specialist chess company)
6) - it is good value with lots of ground covered (192 pages)

The author GM John Nunn is a player with a good reputation for sound advice. He makes sure the reader is never asked to run before they can walk. For a teenager or adult looking for a good value little guide, or refresher course on the rules, I would say this is ideal.

Clear and concise instruction on how to learn the game. The exercises at the end of the chapter's are a must for someone who
is serious to start taking on opponents.

Buy, Read and enjoy it, but most of all learn the basics of this
wonderful game.

This is a very good beginner's book that covers a lot of ground in less than 200 pages. It is well-written and dense for it's size. It will take an average adult or teenager from not knowing anything about chess to being a competent beginner in a short period of time.

The rules of the game are covered first and this is followed by a very detailed section on chess notation. If you are or have ever been confused by this, Nunn makes sure you understand it inside out before moving on.

This book also has sections on winning material, attacks on the king, the various phases of the game and even chess psychology! It provides a great framework for a beginner to work off of and set goals during various stages of the game.

What I also like about this book is the numerous and extremely clear diagrams. Some chess books don't put enough in and you either need to have a board by your side or above average visualization skills. This is not likely for a beginner, so I think this feature adds a lot of value.

In addition, there are many exercise in the book that reinforce key concepts. This is very helpful and the exercises are good. They will help you to retain the material and there is enough material here that you will get your money's worth.

An experienced scholastic chess coach enthusiastically recommended this book to me (there are so many beginner books out there that for a novice the choice is confusing). My friend explained that this book is easily the best guide for an adult looking to learn - well organized and written by a grandmaster who is known for the clarity of his writing and the care he takes over his books.
My friend was right! There are no gimmicks used in this book, just wonderful explanation of how to play the fascinating game of chess. The book begins by explaining the rules and aims of chess, how each piece moves and so on, and how the object is to checkmate the enemy king. This is followed by excellent sections on chess notation, how to win material, attacking play, and sections on the opening, middlegame and ending. There is so much explanation in this book (192 pages) that I regard is as one of the best value books I have purchased in a long time. Thank you, John Nunn, for writing this book!

In this selection of some of the most beautiful and effective chess clashes of the last half century, the emphasis is on tactical acuity. Study of this book will guarantee both enjoyment and improvement.
Grandmaster Larry Evans is a renowned chess writer and columnist, celebrated for his trenchant contributions to the US Chess Federation Magazine Chess Life and for his weekly column which appears in no less than fifty separate papers throughout the USA. Several times US champion, analyst for Bobby Fischer and senior commentator for the 2000 World Chess Championship between Kasparov and Kramnik, Larry Evans is one of the undisputed greats of 20th century chess.

I have over 450 chess books, and was amazed upon buying this book by Evans that I had never heard of it before. It is one of my favorite books. It is everything wonderful in a chess book. First, it is a great games collection, with oever 100 well-annotated games. Often, the annotations of the actual players are inserted. The book is a perfect mix of variations and text, with an emphasis on ideas and instruction. Second, the book is arranged by the names of openings, alphabetically. This allows for you to quickly find games in an opening without even looking at the table of contents. All the Sicilian games are right after the Ruy Lopez games, etc. Third, the moves are formatted in columns, apart from the the text, making the book perfect for covering up the next move with an index card. I am convinced over time that the best games collections also should serve as opening manuals. I end up using them most often if they serve as such. This classic work by Evans, and the two-volume set on Paul Keres by Varnusz are the best examples of this that I can think of right now. (Of course, the Tartakower and DuMont epic is the original classic example of this; but the games in this Evans book have a modern flair, with lots of Sicilians, King's Indians, etc.). In sum, this book is a classic that must be on the shelf of anyone serious about their chess book collection.

Grandmaster Larry Evans annotates a collection of some of the best chess games in the last half century. An enjoyable book which anyone can learn and improve from. Published by Hardinge and Simpole.

larry evans -the grandmaster who assisted bobby fischer in writing his 60 memorable games - is a real authority on chess and in this book he annotates some of his favourite brilliancies. in modern chess writing too many notes are of the wordless symbolic type and in my opinion they completely fail to convey the drama and flavour of a chess battle.

in contrast evans annotates every game as a story and he always puts his finger on the mistakes with unerring accuracy. this is a book to relish if you like playing over fine games beautifully explained by a reliable author.

Richard Reti - one of the leaders of the hypermodern school of chess which rose to prominence in the 1920's - was a formidable over the board grandmaster as shown by his victories at the splendid tournaments of Kaschau 1918, Gothenburg 1920 and Teplitz Schonau 1922. His victims included Capablanca, Alekhine and Nimzowitsch, while his elegant destruction of Bogolyubov deservedly won the beauty prize at New York 1924. Reti was an adept at blindfold chess in which he rivalled Alekhine in the number and strength of his opposition,a lucidly brilliant composer of endgame studies but above all an artist fascinated by the creative forces and energies lying beneath the surface of the chessboard battle. Golombek wrote " Reti became a great and vital writer on the game --for the first time in the history of books on chess a writer capable of a genuine historical survey of the evolution of chess ideas and also of a colourful and poetic picture of the state of contemporary chess had made his appearance." As Reti himself wrote "in the idea of chess and the development of the chess mind we have a picture of the intellectual struggle of mankind."

This small book is essential reading for any chess player. Reti's understanding of the game and his ability to explain the concepts of it are unsurpassed. There's nothing else I can say. Get it.

reti explains the evolution of concepts in paying chess( from 19th century to early 21st century).a player of cnsiderable repute,he is as excellent in explaining chess concepts.some of these are:combinations,open positions,positional play,close positions etc.,

"Modern ideas in Chess" is a very short book - too short, I think, but I include it in my "Best Chess books" list. Far from being just a technical or tactical book (you have hundreds like these), it demonstrates the changing concepts of chess. As I see it, it's one of the most important books for advanced players (only!!) who want to understand the development of the game from the mid. 19th century to the early 20th. century. Why did Capablanca ignored Morphy's move in a certain position? How did Dr. Lasker (probably the best chess player ever) succeed to hold the world champion title for more than 20 years? What ideas came with the "Hyper modern" masters, like Nimzovich, Alekhine, Breyer and Reti himself? What was the typical American style, that Reti observed? These questions and much more are answered in the book. I repeat myself and warn that the book is only for advanced, who's libraries are full of theory and technical books of the game, and want to learn more about the history of the chess thought.