Three masters recall their four decades as teammates from a strong New Jersey chess club.

In blitz and rapid it is important to make the right decisions quickly and almost instinctively. That is why world-famous opening expert Grandmaster Evgeny Sveshnikov and his son, International Master Vladimir Sveshnikov, have created a chess opening repertoire for club players that is forcing, both narrow and deep, and aggressive.

"In this book Yuriy does not overwhelm you with variations, but instead he focuses a lot on the verbal explanations and understanding of the typical positions. At the same time, you can be confident that his recommendations are quite sound and have been thoroughly checked with extensive databases, strong engines as well as critically looked upon from the human perspective. I am entirely sure that studying the materials presented in this work will benefit players of all levels, from some relatively inexperienced club players to even strong players." ~ Susan Polgar

Taking your opponent out of his comfort zone is a good idea to start your game with. Grandmaster Sergey Kasparov pushes this concept one step further: lure your opponent onto the slippery paths of the Philidor Swamp!

This exceptional book completes the unique project where one of the greatest players of our time transforms her personal journey to the top into a roadmap for everyone who ever wanted to better themselves in the game of chess.

A Guide to Chess Improvement features the very best of Dan Heisman's multi-award winning chess column Novice Nook, which ran for over ten years at the popular website ChessCafe.com. This book is full of valuable instruction, insight and practical advice on a wide range of key subjects: general improvement, thought processes, planning and strategy, tactics, endgame play, technique, time management and much more besides. Heisman has thoroughly revised, expanded and updated his work to produce an easy-to-navigate guide. He has also included brand new and exclusive columns. Any player from beginner to expert who is serious about improving their chess should read this book!

In this guide International Master Vladimir Barsky teaches the method created by his mentor Viktor Khenkin (1923-2010). It’s based on an ingenious classification of the most frequently occurring mating schemes. A wide range of chess players will find it an extremely useful tool to recognize mating patterns and calculate the often narrow path to the kill. All the 1,000 examples (850 of them in exercise format) that Barsky presents are from games played in 21st century. He has carefully selected the most instructive combinations and lucidly explains the typical techniques to corner your opponent’s king. More often than you would expect, positions that look innocent at first sight, turn out to contain a mating pattern. This is not just another book full of chess puzzles. It’s a brilliantly organized course that has proven to be effective. Finding mate isn’t rocket science, but you need to know what to look for. Vladimir Barsky teaches you exactly that.

In addition to the Pirc, the first part of the book covers all possible set-ups in which White refrains from the moves 1.e4 and 1.d4, namely: 1.f4, 1.b3, 1.b4 (Chapter 1), 1.Nf3 (Chapter 2), 1.c4 (Chapters 3, 4). The second part of the book (Chapters 5-9) is devoted to opening schemes in which White does play 1.d4, but then he does not follow up with c2-c4. This is the Trompowsky Attack (d4, Bg5) and the London System (d4, Nf3, Bf4).”

The second volume of the Black repertoire is dedicated to the King’s Indian Defense

In the second volume of this repertoire set GM Kornev analyzes Caro-Kann as well as openings where White doesn’t play 1.e4 or 1.d4

The combination of the Slav Defense and the Caro-Kann Defense enables Black to facilitate his defense in the opening and to avoid numerous unpleasant schemes for him. For example, after 1.c4, he can simply play 1…c6, without being afraid of 2.e4. In the above mentioned London System, after the moves 1.d4 d5 2.Bf4 c5 3.e3, Black has the resource 3…cxd4 4.exd4, after which there arises by transposition a variation from the Caro-Kann Defense which is practically harmless for Black.

…we deal with the openings in which Black fianchettoes his dark-squared bishop