Goethe once wrote, “Everything is both simpler than we can imagine, and more complicated than we can conceive.” He could well have had chess endgames in mind. Endgames have fewer pieces on the board than middlegames but this does not necessarily make them “easier” to play or understand.
Tactical expertise is, understandably, generally associated with middlegame (and sometimes opening) positions. However, tactics are also crucial in endgames – a point that is sometimes overlooked. Even some quite simple looking pawn endgames can feature complex tactical ideas. Tactics in endgames also tend to be very different to middlegame tactics. As well as the familiar themes of pins, skewers and forks, endgames also feature unique concepts that rarely occur in middlegames such as pawn breakthroughs, manoeuvring for zugzwang and active use of the king as an aggressive unit.
In this book the highly experienced chess author and coach Cyrus Lakdawala guides the reader through the complexities of endgame tactical play. Lakdawala assembles positions that are most effective to improve tactical ability. Work your way through this book and you will undoubtedly see the results in your own games.
300 tactical puzzles from real endgames!
After the opening and the middlegame, Gods have placed the endgame!
This book touches upon an important but rarely covered topic of "tactics in the endgame". Books on this subject are either rare or still not out there!
You are not alone if you have you lost games from winning positions because you did not spot your opponent's tactical shot. Or maybe you missed a tactic of your own? Inspite of your material advantage, you could not bring home the full point in the end? Practice is your only friend and coach.
This book aims to give you ample practice from tactical endgame positions to really convert that loss into a draw or a draw into a win! Watch out for the Knight forks. Check how other players sacrifice their valuable pieces to ensure the pawn promotes. Or the simplification tactics to win a won endgame!
Unlike other books which offer a high number of generic puzzles, this book has carefully chosen and manually selected high quality puzzles from real games.
Chess Masters stuff as many positions and patterns in their head as possible and this book gives you an opportunity to do that!
HIGHLIGHTS
• 300 puzzles from real games! These puzzles are not made up. The themes/patterns can occur in your games too!
• The puzzles are broken into 4 levels and are suited for players of all strength
• Alternative lines are annotated so you are not left wondering why a certain move was not plausible
• The solution is placed immediately after the puzzle and also has a accompanying diagram so you can easily visualize the variation on the board without moving back and forth
• Each solution is marked with an arrow so you can easily scan the first move without having to read the complete notation. This can also be a good way to get a hint for the first move without revealing the complete solution
No matter your skill level, this book is the right practice companion for you!
IM Bonin offers the answers to practical questions that every chessplayer faces as the clock is ticking.
Kalinin helps players seeking the master title by showing how concrete knowledge leads to improved decisions at the board. He stresses the essence of the classics and the importance of human interaction in reaching analytical mastery.
The lines covered in this book, the Ruy Lopez Main Lines, arise (with a few exceptions for move order and such) after 1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bb5 a6 4 Ba4 Nf6 5 0-0. Some of the lines are incredibly theoretical, but rather than burden you with a ton of theory in lines you will have limited chance of using in your own games, the emphasis is on the lines that are more likely to occur in your games. Those lines will be in chapters 3 and 4, the two longest chapters of the book. This book is by no means an all-encompassing theory work, which means that there is a lot of theory that is not discussed in the notes. This is of course intentional. The book is written to entertain and inspire. If you find some lines that you like, you are encouraged to dive deeper into those lines before using them in your own games.
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.