The subject of just about every review I’ve written so far is that one must work to improve. And most of us are lazy, or more charitably aren’t believers in the need for work. And this leads many of us – well, me specifically – to collect more books than will ever be useful.
There are several good sites that have some fine book reviews … and, yes, Chess Café is one of those sites. But there are often ways of marrying the work ethic we should be practicing to the desire to select the next book that will add (transparently) 200 points to our official rating.
A minor digression here. I, and most other chess players, have an incredible amount of respect for British GM John Nunn. A renowned theoretician and incredibly strong player, he is also a GM of problem solving. As an author he has written some of the best chess books of all time, and I don’t have a problem recommending anything he’s written (although a particular book may not be suitable for where you are … and where you are likely EVER to be!)
And now with the formation of Gambit Publications he is a chess publisher as well.
It’s always difficult as a publisher to ensure an evenness of quality in one’s book offerings. Obviously Garry Kasparov is not going to write a book about everything in your vision, and he certainly won’t do it for what you are likely able to pay him. So a publisher makes tradeoffs; goes with some new names; works with them through the creative process, but basically hopes for the best. Because when all is said and done and you have a book that you’ve already spent some money on, why not try and sell it? This leads to some variable–ness in quality … in the best case!
What I like about Gambit is that the variable–ness is kept to a minimum. There are some titles that I like better (like Joe Gallagher’s 365 Ways to Checkmate) and some that I don’t favor (like Beat the Grandmasters). But that says as much about me as it does about the books.
But what I really like about Gambit is that you can try before you buy. Just about every book has a downloadable pdf with a few pages from the exact book. They are nice enough to give you a coherent thought from the book’s author that gives you a good feel for what the book is like. If you like working through that excerpt, then buy one book and work through the rest of it. If not, you’ve saved your money and you can find another excerpt that appeals to you.
So here’s another source of FREE chess instruction!
Give it a try and start becoming familiar with some of the best chess literature developed today!
In the interest of fairness let me also say a few (for me) words about the other new chess publisher, Everyman Chess. I decided that I preferred Gambit over Everyman a few years ago. Both publishers try to have a consistent look across their product lines and that’s important. Gambit tends to have more “meat” in their books, and so I regard them as a better value. For example, Glenn Flear wrote a three volume endgame series for Everyman (Improve Your Endgame Play, Mastering the Endgame, and Test Your Endgame Thinking). Now the series itself (what I’ve worked through) is pretty good, but they split it up into three volumes totaling almost $55 (even on Amazon.com. It’s more if you count the fourth volume Starting Out: Pawn Endgames). That’s too much! Gambit’s offering (Fundamental Chess Endings) is half that, quite extensive and pretty readable too. And FCE also encourages you to work through it which makes it even better (there’s that work ethic again!)
Of course now I have to rethink my opinion of Everyman, because the future best–chess–writer–of–all–time (former world champion Garry Kasparov) writes for them. They also have a widely–acclaimed new writer in Jacob Aagaard. He’s written 5 volumes, starting with Excelling in Chess that are quite good. Be warned though – he’s also a champion of the “to improve you work your tail off” school, and he’s actually done it! The other warning is that none of his books are for beginners and I wouldn’t touch them until you are rated about 1600 or so.
Some of their titles do have preview sections available on Amazon.com. For example, some of Aagaard’s books and the new Master’s series book on Alexander Alekhine have excerpts on Amazon.com that you can look at. But why not the Master’s series book on Mikhail Tal (which I have and is quite good) or the newly released one on Bobby Fischer (Russians vs. Fischer)? Inconsistencies like this boggle the mind sometime ….
When I was growing up, I received a lot of chess books from relatives. Now some of them were quite good … and some weren’t. And I think it encouraged me to read them like novels instead of work through one at a time. I don’t want that to happen to you!
So here’s an offer to the readers of this website: Dr. Fleetwood has created an email account for me at bob@delawarechess.org. Send me the list of chess books that you own and I’ll create a recommendation for you on which one to work through next. If you’re thinking about buying a book, let me know and I’ll try to create a mini–review for you. When I get my first email, I’ll also create a topic on the Forums that the discussion can be continued on.
And remember – feedback of any kind is always encouraged and appreciated!
Yours for chess,
Bob