This book presents a multi-faceted approach to the Reti – 1.Nf3 d5, followed by c2-c4. The core of the proposed repertoire is the topical system 2.e3 Nf6 3.c4 and 2.e3 c5 3.c4 d4 4.b4. Play often transposes to the English Opening with White having sidestepped 1.c4 e5.
For those who do not like the Reversed Blumenfeld and seek clear strategic play, the author adds three chapters on the Nimzo-Larsen System 1.Nf3 d5 2.e3 c5 3.b3. With this move order White prevents ...d4 altogether.
The book also covers 1.Nf3 d5 2.c4 d4 3.b4, which opens the door towards the main lines of the QGD and the Slav. It does allow the challenging 3...f6 4.e3 e5 or 3...Bg4, but is the only option if White prefers schemes without e2-e3, as 1.Nf3 d5 2.c4 e6 3.d4 and 2...c6 3.d4 Nf6 4.Nc3.
The choice on move 2 and 3 should be based on reader’s preferred way of meeting the Slav, the Queen’s Gambit Declined and the QGA.
Semko Semkov is a chess journalist and theoretician, with two GM norms. His most famous books are The Modern English, The Most Flexible Sicilian, The Taimanov-Sheveningen Hybrid, Understanding the QGA.
Available via subscription
British Chess Magazine (January 2024)
In response to 1.e4, White’s most common first move, it has long been recognized that when and if Black can play ...d5 safely, the result is approximate equality. Scandinavian devotees argue all that can happen on Move 1! But it’s hardly a “peaceful” equality.
But do we really need a book that is a blur of all sorts of black and white possibilities with countless tightly-nested game fragments? Hardly. Double Trouble is a straightforward volume of repertoire recommendations, easy to understand and easy to play.
The book is in three parts. Part One, besides introducing the book generally, covers the very first moves of the Scandinavian Defense and White’s early deviations. Anyone who plays the Scandinavian will find this section quite helpful. Then Part Two covers Qd6 + g6 systems, while Part Three covers the very different Nf6 system.
In this book, popular author and Correspondence Master Marek Soszynski gives you a defense to 1.e4 that can honestly be called “complete.” Your prep could not be better...This book cuts [the theory] down to size. Marek Soszynski gives you just what you need to know to show that the old “theoretical” equalizer, 1...d5, can indeed be played, and played with verve, on Move 1! – From the Foreword by Al Lawrence
Double Trouble Scandinavian Style: Equalize early and then play for a win!
The best chess training closely resembles the activity you're training for. This book provides you with an essential component - decision-making in the crucial positions of a real game of chess, played by club players rather than grandmasters. You have to answer the same questions that you face when you stare at the chess board and have to find a move.
Amateur games can be very instructive. Studying the games of top players will undoubtedly help you to improve. However, it is often more enlightening to make decisions or see mistakes at a lower level, as they are easier for most of us to relate to.
Thomas Willemze has carefully selected thirty games that illustrate an important theme, for example:
– Dealing with irreversible moves
– Rerouting your rooks
– Aligning your bishop and pawns
– Converting a long-term advantage
– Taming the London
Willemze is a master at choosing just the right positions to help you improve your chess knowledge and understanding.Amateur games can be very instructive. Studying the games of top players will undoubtedly help you to improve. However, it is often more enlightening to make decisions or see mistakes at a lower level, as they are easier for most of us to relate to.
Thomas Willemze has carefully selected thirty games that illustrate an important theme, such as the centre, king safety or a space advantage. Willemze is a master at choosing just the right positions to help you improve your chess knowledge and understanding.
Thomas Willemze is an experienced chess trainer and International Master from the Netherlands. All thirty games in What Would You Play have been published in New In Chess magazine. Willemze has written five books for New In Chess, all of which are available as courses on Chessable.
CHESS INFORMANT’S 158th ADVENTURE
AURORA
CONTENTS:
• Leitao – Opening Ideas in Modern Chess
• Shyam Sundar – Grand Swiss (This or That?)
• Perunovic – European Team Championship
• Foisor – USA Women Championship (Tournament Review)
• Moradiabadi – USA Championship (Tournament Review)
• Ntirlis – The Damiano Defence (Theoretical Survey)
• Prusikin – The Weak King (Instructive Lesson)
• Perelshteyn – The Alekhine 4 Pawns Atack (Theoretical Survey)
• Rogers – Asian Team Championship 1981 (Roger’s Reminiscences)
• Griffin – Larsen – Byrne, Havana 1966 (From Informant Archives)
• Barak Gonen – Correspondence Chess
Traditional sections: games, combinations, endings, Tournament reviews, the best game from the preceding volume and the most important theoretical novelty from the preceding volume.
The periodical that pros use with pleasure is at the same time a must have publication for all serious chess students!
Dragoljub Velimirovic was a former Yugoslav - Serbian, chess grandmaster whose international career was handicapped by political intrigues and his outspoken temperament. During the heyday of the USSR as the greatest national chess power, the former Yugoslavia was capable of running the Soviet Union a good second. Dragoljub Velimirovic posed a real threat to the men from Moscow.
Velimirovic was born in 1942 to a prominent family from Valjevo, in the former Yugoslavia. He was introduced to chess at the age of seven by his mother, Jovanka Velimirovic, one of Yugoslavia's leading female chess players. He died at the age 72, being one of the last players to develop a system or strategy that is so inventive it bears its creator's name. It is a feat that is unlikely to be repeated in the modern era, when computer-based games and databases so thoroughly dominate competition that it is almost impossible to come up with something new. That does not mean that players were more talented or courageous in the decades when Velimirovic was in his prime. Velimirovic, who became a grandmaster in 1973, was never among the 20 top-ranked players in the world. And that was when there were only 200 or so grandmasters; today, there are about 2,400.
The new volume in internationally bestselling series. Are you ready to seriously improve your game?It has been said that chess is 99% tactics but whether that is an accurate reflection is hard to tell. Nevertheless, it is important. But if you are like most players, you only discover the tactics after you come home and run through your game with a chess engine. So what to do? In the present book, you will be challenged 404 times but unlike most tactics puzzle books you don't know what your objective is: do I need to find a mate, find an opportunity skewer or pin a piece, use a tactical turn to gain a positional advantage and how far do I need to calculate?These questions are you are faced with when you play your own games and therefore this book tries to replicate this position. Your one advantage over the players in the respective positions is that you know that there is supposed to be something in there for you to find.The puzzles vary a lot in difficulty, some are relatively easy, some are incredibly difficult, but most are somewhere in between. However, most of the puzzles are layered so that even when you think the answer is obvious, it is worth looking further because your idea may be the decoy left there for you to get distracted from the actual solution.Working through the puzzles and then carefully play through the thoroughly annotated solutions will help you to up your tactical radar as well as your calculation skills. So if you are up for the challenge, here is the opportunity to take the leap forward. Good luck!
Originally published at the beginning of the 20th century as part of a series for chess improvers on all phases of the chess game, this little book contains examples of pawn play in endgames that inexperienced and club players will greatly benefit from studying.
With more than 100 well-chosen positions, the author illustrates the types of chess endgames that players should master once they understand and master the fundamentals.
The material has been reexamined, reanalyzed, and edited by FIDE Master Carsten Hansen.
This is the first time this book has been published in algebraic notation.
In this book, German-English Grandmaster Mieses has selected 100 fascinating endgame compositions by several of the greatest endgame composers of the age, such as Kubbel, Rinck, Troitzky, the Platov Brothers and many more from the classic period of chess up to the conclusion of World War 1.
The material is split into eight chapters, covering all types of endgames.
All of the studies and the analysis have been re-examined by Carsten Hansen, adding a fascinating new perspective to these classic compositions.
There is lots of exciting material to examine and learn from for dedicated students.
Originally published at the beginning of the 20th century as part of a series for chess improvers on all phases of the chess game, this little book contains samples of all types of endgames that inexperienced and club players will greatly benefit from studying.
• The author has presented a complete opening repertoire for White.
• After 1.Nc3, the game can take various trans-positional paths.
• The opening move 1.Nc3 aims to control the center indirectly, and it allows for a flexible development of the pieces.
• The move prepares for subsequent development, and the game might transpose into various other openings depending on the subsequent moves by both players.
• While 1.Nc3 is not as popular or mainstream as some other first moves (like 1.e4 or 1.d4), it can be an interesting choice for players who want to steer the game away from well-known theoretical lines early on and enter into positions that might be less studied.
• As with any opening, understanding the resulting pawn structures, piece placements, and plans is crucial for successful play.
British Chess Magazine (December 2023)