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BCM Chess Book Reviews : July 2006Return to the BCM Review Index
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The English grandmaster explains the strategy of the Queen’s Indian
via in-depth annotations of 25 recent games. In this new large-format
‘Chess Explained’ series, the emphasis is more on textual exposition
than quantities of variations and sub-variations so this has the flavour
of a general overview (albeit a very high-level one). Wells’ writing
is, as ever, of a high standard and he freely shares his ideas and insights
into what is a very reliable defence system for Black but one which is
perhaps under-utilised at club level. All the games are very recent and
there are three chapters on various lines after 4 g3, two more on lines
after 4 a3, plus single chapters on 4 Nc3 and 4 e4. JS.
The author tells us that he was fascinated by the endgame as a teenager.
Would that we all had been: the realisation of how many points are lost
by poor endgame technique only tends to creep up on one in later life.
If only I had my time again... but there is no point wasting time on regrets.
Much better to buy this book and read it. One of the hardest things in
chess writing is to make endgame education palatable, but this book succeeds
where many others have failed. The book starts with an exposition of general
principles before moving on to specific examples, and ends with an entertaining
essay on the four types of chessplayer – reflectors, theorists, pragmatics
and activists – which Hansen introduced in his earlier book for Gambit,
Foundations of Chess Strategy. We haven’t room here to discuss
what these names mean – you will need to buy the book and find out.
JS.
This is a fully revised edition of a book which has already been published in German. It goes through all the usual tactical elements, such as the pin, fork, discovered attack, etc. The author likes to inculcate a systematic approach to tactical calculation. For example, he recommends what he calls status examination. By that he means a close study of each piece on the board in turn, with reference to whether it is attacked, defended, etc, and then how the pieces interact with each other. Whether this adds anything to the identification of patterns acquired via practice – or whether it is just a new name for something we have always learnt to do intuitively – is debatable, but his logical approach is at least interesting. It is a well presented work and contains a lot of entertaining tactical examples to work through. JS.
A curiosity by our late, great columnist: in 1985 he started sending
his friends items of historical interest which he had photocopied or otherwise
acquired. There were 17 ‘Christmas cards’ in total, and together
they amount to a substantial collection of obscure and esoteric source
data. Whyld’s idea was not original, incidentally: Alain C White
did the same thing at the beginning of the 20th century. Articles range
in length from 7 to 60 pages. The series kicks off with a 20-page booklet
which Whyld found in Liverpool Public Library called The Story of Chess.
Other subjects covered: Biobibliography List; Blackburne’s Matches
1887, Letters on the History and Literature of Chess; Development of the
Chess Problem. Not for the general reader, but chess history buffs will
have a field day. JS.
This is a collection of 100 games by the late English grandmaster with
light notes, partly by the author and partly from Miles’ own contributions
to the various magazines and columns with which he was associated. The
games are arranged chronologically, with each chapter introduced with
some short introductory comments quoted from various sources (such as
the writings of Genna Sosonko and Leonard Barden). A number of crosstables
have also been included to illustrate Miles’ major tournament successes.
The fact that Keene should be writing a book on Miles
might raise eyebrows amongst those who are aware of the animosity that
existed between the two in later years. But there is not too much evidence
that this has coloured the bulk of the book. In a short postscript Keene
endeavours to produce a balanced account of the great, pioneering chessplayer
and the rather more complex and difficult man. Tony Miles was both of
these things. The author’s criticism of a previous book on Miles
by some of his friends (It’s Only Me by Geoff Lawton) seems
a trifle unkind and not fully justified. The reviewer’s opinion is
that the Lawton and the Keene books are of about equal merit, but that
the definitive book that Miles’s achievements truly deserve has yet
to be written. JS.
32 NIC Surveys, copious forum letters by Simon Williams, Vilela and others,
Sosonko on the power of the check, Glenn Flear’s book reviews (on
Play 1 e4 e5! by Nigel Davies, Understanding the King’s Indian by
Mikhail Golubev, The Hippopotamus Rises by Andrew Martin, Bird’s
Opening by Timothy Taylor)... all the usual ingredients are here in this
informative and readable periodical on the opening. JS.
Another collection of tactical opening tricks in a well-presented volume
from New in Chess. The chosen openings may not be the first ones you think
of when it comes to trickery but the authors have found a large number
of both subtle and unsubtle man-traps which can be used to gain an easy
point. JS.
The melodramatic title and cover are designed to get potential readers
excited by this book containing a selection of Botvinnik’s training
games. It contains 97 such games, from 1936 to 1970, some of which have
been annotated by the author; others are merely bare game scores. Very
few of the games appear on published computer databases but the provenance
of the games is not mentioned. Timman’s notes and the rarity value
of the game perhaps give the book some value but are badly let down by
poor layout and unattractive presentation. The diagrams are tiny and there
is a vast amount of white space in the book. The blurb on the back is
strangely worded and contains an extraordinarily irrelevant attack on
political correctness. Overall the book is very poor value for money.
JS.
This neat little booklet contains 50 chess diagrams taken from the games
of Bobby Fischer, each showing a critical position in which a very strong
move follows. Readers are invited to find the correct continuation. Slight
but entertaining. JS.
As per the Fischer booklet, except that Judit Polgar is the subject.
The full game score from which the puzzle position is derived is given
on the following page. JS.
This is a guide for use by parents in teaching their children to play
chess. Having said which, it assumes that the reader already knows the
rules of the game and gives little guidance in how to teach the basic
rules of the game to a child. So guidance starts at the point where teacher
and pupil know the moves. As such, it seems a well-structured course book
which would be very useful to a conscientious but inexperienced chess
parent.
Contains a database of 1,311 recent games, of which three are text reports
with 446 games containing analysis and variations. Opening theory databases
include coverage of lines in the English Opening, Caro Kann, Sveshnikov
Sicilian, French Defence, Elephant Gambit and the Nimzo Indian. Karsten
Müller provides 39 instructional endgame positions and puzzles. Peter
Wells revisits the topic of the exchange sacrifice, whilst Valery Atlas
brings us some tactical positions in which the power of the major pieces
are unleashed. JS.
This disk has 54 database texts, 500 games annotated by the author, a
database with 75,000+ games, plus a 40-game training database, an opening
tree and the necessary reader software. The Alapin (1 e4 c5 2 c3) has
undergone a transformation from a sedate line used by people averse to
learning specific lines into something as rich in theory as many other
variations of the Sicilian. Rogozenko has done a good job of delineating
the theory via the textual overviews. He also deals adequately with all
the transpositional possibilities that 2 c3 is prone too. JS.
A collection of 588,000 correspondence games from 1804 until 2006 including
all the games of the correspondence world championships and other major
events. It also features a correspondence chess playerbase, which includes
about 63,000 names. An upgrade from Corr Database 2004 is available
at £35.99 – if ordering, please return the CD-ROM.
JS.
