This book not only covers the most-played opening in online chess, but a complementary opening system as well. It makes sense to study both the versatile London System – moving the bishop to f4 - and the more aggressive Trompowsky Attack, moving the bishop to g5. This will offer White more flexibility and deepen your understanding of both systems. It gives White the opportunity to surprise his opponent, while still playing the same opening patterns. And both openings are connected by a large number of possible transpositions.
This complete opening repertoire has a limited (but flexible) scope, which is ideal for club players who can spend only so many hours on studying chess. Like all Moska’s books, Trompowsky Attack & London System is practical, accessible, original, entertaining and inspiring. The two systems are explored in 46 games, of which Moskalenko played eleven himself.
Viktor Moskalenko (1960) is one of the leading chess instructors of our time. The Ukrainian Grandmaster has authored numerous inspiring opening manuals such as An Attacking Repertoire for White with 1.d4, The Even More Flexible French, The Wonderful Winawer, Training with Moska and The Fabulous Budapest Gambit.
Turbo-Charge Your Tactics 1 is essentially a chess puzzle book, but not a typical one. It’s a multi-year effort by GM Mykhaylo Oleksiyenko and his world-renowned trainer IM Vladimir Grabinsky to introduce you to the world of “unnatural” tactical moves.
Presenting examples of extreme beauty, no matter where they come from – be it online bullet or world-class grandmaster praxis – this book will cure your “selective blindness” by destroying the false notion of chess principles being a set of rules, instead of helpful guidelines. Most chess games are decided by tactics, so solving tactical puzzles is the most effective path to improvement.
Turbo-Charge Your Tactics 2 concludes a multi-year effort by GM Mykhaylo Oleksiyenko and world-renowned trainer IM Vladimir Grabinsky to create the perfect chess puzzle books. This second volume builds upon the first, using games from the World Champions and their challengers. Most chess games are decided by tactics, so solving tactical puzzles is the most effective path to improvement.
This book also contains a special chapter with expert guidance on how to use chess engines. The engines might analyse precisely but they can also harm our chess understanding if followed blindly, so we must know when and how to use them.
The diverse set of tactical ideas involving two bishops in the finale will enable them to gain a deeper understanding of how the bishop pair combines.
The diverse set of tactical ideas involving two knights in the finale will enable them to gain a deeper understanding of how the knight pair combines.
I realize that this book will not cover all open wounds, nevertheless my aim to write a manual about defense which can help us defenders enduring the hardest difficulties in practice, seems to be achieved. Personally speaking this book helped me as a defender to approach a worse position in a much more objective way, optimally use all of my defensive resources available, both psychologically and technically, to set – even under the most dire circumstances – pitfalls, while keeping my nerves under control.
This book is about the practical approach to the game of chess. It shaped me as a player and now I would like to share my philosophy with you. My objective is to combat several generally accepted misconceptions, such as a) only studying opening theory will make you a better player, b) one should always follow the first or second line shown by Komodo or Stockfish, and finally, c) that “in theory” is equivalent to “over the board”. The last fallacy is especially dangerous because it implies that players will keep on making the best moves over the board, and therefore sidelines should never be played as the opponent will always find a way to retain and convert the advantage. That is in theory. In practice, however, many players will feel like fish out of water once they end up in a position that is objectively better for them but one that they have never analyzed. Overall, based on my experience as a chess professional, I strongly believe that the above-mentioned fallacies do not hold true empirically, The book is divided into four parts. Part I covers sidelines in the mainstream openings where I take a major opening and analyze one or several sidelines. This is the most theoretical part of the book, where I share a significant amount of original thoughts and analyses that constitute my opening repertoire. Part II discusses the concept that I refer to as systems. It still involves theory, but less so in comparison to Part I. What I am trying to convey in this part is the “schematic thinking” – where you think in terms of plans and typical ideas. Part III takes one step further in abstraction – it analyzes notable modern games where one player showed ambition early on in the game and it worked out well for him. Part IV covers the so-called “early surprises” where early on in the game a player implemented a move that shocked his opponent.
This work is a follow-up to my first book “Unconventional Approaches to Modern Chess – Rare Ideas for Black” which was published in February 2019. This time, I am flipping the board and exploring offbeat opening ideas from White’s perspective. The structure of the book has remained basically the same as before, except that I merged Part III (Showing Ambitions) and Part IV (Early Surprises) into one combined chapter Ambitions & Surprises. Part I explores sidelines in several mainstream openings. This is the most in-depth chapter of the book in terms of opening analysis. Part II presents two systems that are quite universal in nature and can be used against more than one opening. Part III gives a broad overview of a variety of aggressive lines taken from GM-level games. As I stated in the previous book, I’m a big believer in the practical approach to chess. In order to win, you don’t need to find the best move in every position. It is neither possible nor necessary. To win a game, it is enough to be just a little bit better than your opponent. To make this happen, especially when facing a strong player, you must force your opponent to solve practical problems. You must get them into a position where the cost of a potential mistake is much higher than usual. If there is no room for your opponent to make a mistake, then they are unlikely to make it. It is your job to give them plenty of opportunity to go wrong. As Mikhail Tal famously put it, “You must take your opponent into a deep dark forest where 2+2=5, and the path leading out is only wide enough for one.” This book aims to expose you to a variety of opening ideas that can help you to achieve this goal. I hope you find reading it beneficial in your future endeavors at the chess board.
This book invites you beneath the surface, where you can learn to navigate the depths of chess. Jan Markos shows how a strong player perceives chess, which features of a position he focuses on, and how he thinks at the board.