Mark Dvoretsky is regarded as the leading chess coach in the world, and in this series of books he reveals the training methods that have transformed so many of his pupils into champions. This first title is devoted to the endgame and examines a wide range of positions, taken mainly from games of the author's pupils. The comments are packed with practical advice and special test positions and frequent questions ensure that the reader's participation in the book is an active one.

The computer has changed the way top players think about chess. The silicon mind has no psychological barriers. It is "willing" to check moves that most humans, including top players, consider absurd and reject instantly. Thus this brave, new computer era inevitably leads to a reassessment of old axioms, principles and evaluations. In Play Unconventional Chess, the reader will discover the incredible power unconventional moves can have. These moves contradict the most fundamental principles of the "old chess", and yet most of them played by leading grandmasters. At first sight these moves look so strange that the reader can not avoid asking, "Was this grandmaster was inspired or drunk?" The answer will definitely surprise you. As we progress as chess players we quickly learn a set of guidelines which help us to formulate plans, develop typical strategies and recognize key tactics. However, chess is not an easy game, with fixed 'rules' that can be applied to every single position. In fact, blindly following such rules proves to be counterproductive and prevents a player from moving on to the next level, whereas knowing when to 'break' these rules is precisely the skill which separates the best from the rest. In Break the Rules!, Grandmaster Neil McDonald studies in depth the key components of successful rule-breaking in chess. Drawing upon his own experience and using illuminating examples from modern grandmaster chess, McDonald examines how to avoid stereotypical thinking, how to exploit typical thinking patterns, and how to confuse and beat opponents with surprising ideas.

Approach every endgame with a winning strategy!
Good books about endgames for beginners are few and far between. Winning Chess Endings is a great one - a gripping introduction to what you need to know to win chess endings, taught by American Grandmaster Yasser Seirawan. His entertaining, easy-to-understand style, incisive stories and insiders advice will help you develop a solid grasp of proven principles that you can apply with confidence whenever a game goes the distance. You'll learn to prevail time and again in endgames with common and uncommon combinations and pieces.
Winning Chess Endings explains how to: relentlessly find checkmates, from easy to hard, in all basic endgame patterns; master the intricacies of King and Pawn Endings; win consistently in the most common endgame - the Rook ending; master the pros and cons of Bishop vs. Knight Endgames; seize the advantage in Rook Pawn and Queen Pawn endings; play like a grandmaster in solitaire endings
Winning Chess Endings teaches endgame strategies in an exciting new way - by putting you in the middle of the action with firsthand stories taken directly from famous matches. Pull up a chair and watch the world's most exciting chess endings. Then become an endgame master!

"Grandmaster Repertoire" is a series of high quality chess books based on the main lines, written by strong grandmasters. The aim is to provide the reader with a complete repertoire at a level good enough for elite tournaments, and certainly also for the club championship. "Grandmaster Repertoire 8 - The Grunfeld Defence" offers a repertoire for Black against 1.d4. Avrukh's two previous "Grandmaster Repertoire" books for White received universal rave reviews and have been hugely influential on chess players all over the world, including at the very highest level. This volume covers lines such as the Fianchetto variation, the Russian variation with 4.Nf3 and 5.Qb3, Bf4 lines, Bg5 lines, and all White's minor tries.

Proper technique is central to executing successful endgame play. This instructional guide provides information on how to study the endgame and analyze endgame positions. It also illustrates the highly important technique of converting an advantage.

The Modern Benoni arises after 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5 3.d5 e6. It leads to unbalanced structures and exciting play, so it has naturally been a favourite of ambitious attacking players such as Tal, Fischer and, more recently, Topalov, Ivanchuk and Gashimov. The Modern Benoni is a bold answer to 1.d4 and GM Marian Petrov shows it is possible to play this line confidently without memorising extreme levels of theory. Black must certainly be well prepared, but the workload is less than most aggressive defences -- this book supplies all Black needs to know.

The Samisch variation is a powerful method to counter the popular King's Indian Defence. The key move is the advance f2-f3, consolidating White's central space advantage and limiting Black's options for counterplay. In the traditional Samisch White develops the queen's bishop on e3 but in the modern version, as explored in this book, the move Bg5 is preferred. This creates further problems for Black as the natural King's Indian counter ... e7-e5 allows White a potentially strong pin against the f6-knight, while chasing the bishop with ... h6 and ... g5 creates kingside weaknesses. ----- * Learn to play the Modern Samisch with confidence --- * Emphasis on plans and strategies * Written by an expert on the Modern Samisch

From America's foremost chess coach and game strategist for Netflix's The Queen's Gambit comes a superbly crafted compendium of brilliant strategies fans can use to measure their skills against the champion, improve their game, or simply have fun. As the youngest world champion ever, Gary Kasparov inspires new chess fans and experienced players alike with his brilliant grasp of tactics. Running the gamut from simple forks and pins to subtle maneuvers and deep combinations, it is his tactical brilliance that catapulted Kasparov to the top. This tactical chess bible traces the world champion's development from school days to world-class competition, analyzing both the actual moves and traps or dead-ends he or his opponent sidestepped in more than 140 carefully selected tournament positions. Includes a glossary and index of individual tactics allowing players to bone up on any specific weakness in the game.

"First the idea and then the move!" Miguel Najdorf used to say in his habitually enthusiastic fashion; that statement is the perfect summary of planning in chess. Planning is of crucial importance in chess and yet this is an area that has not been well discussed or explained to ambitious players who wish to improve. A very well known saying in chess is "Better a bad plan than no plan at all". Playing without a plan - effectively staggering from one move to the next - is a recipe for disaster. It is essential to have some kind of idea of what you are trying to achieve and how to go about it. However, planning is not a straightforward matter. A good plan might be very short, lasting just two or three moves. Another plan might require almost an entire game to implement. A plan can be highly ambitious and complex or somewhat modest and simple. In chess, as in life, circumstances can change quickly and when they do, new plans are needed. How is a player expected to juggle all these different concepts while dealing with the immediate problems posed by the opponent's most recent move? In this book, grandmaster and experienced author Zenon Franco explains planning in detail. He organises material in terms of: typical structures, advantage in space, manoeuvring play, simplification and, finally attack and defence. Using games played by elite players he explains how plans are formed and carried out in these different scenarios. If you want to take your game to the next level, then Planning Move by Move will enable you to do this.

Power Play The Literature and Politics of Chess in the Late Middle Ages Jenny Adams The game of chess reached western Europe by the year 1000, and within several generations it had become one of the most popular pastimes ever. Both men and women, and even priests played the game despite the Catholic Church's repeated prohibitions. Characters in countless romances, "chansons de geste," and moral tales of the eleventh through twelfth centuries also played chess, which often symbolized romantic attraction or sexual consummation. In "Power Play," Jenny Adams looks to medieval literary representations to ask what they can tell us both about the ways the game changed as it was naturalized in the West and about the society these changes reflected. In its Western form, chess featured a queen rather than a counselor, a judge or bishop rather than an elephant, a knight rather than a horse; in some manifestations, even the pawns were differentiated into artisans, farmers, and tradespeople with discrete identities. "Power Play" is the first book to ask why chess became so popular so quickly, why its pieces were altered, and what the consequences of these changes were. More than pleasure was at stake, Adams contends. As allegorists and political theorists connected the moves of the pieces to their real-life counterparts, chess took on important symbolic power. For these writers and others, the game provided a means to figure both human interactions and institutions, to envision a civic order not necessarily dominated by a king, and to imagine a society whose members acted in concert, bound together by contractual and economic ties. The pieces on the chessboard were more than subjects; they were individuals, playing by the rules. Jenny Adams teaches English at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. The Middle Ages Series 2006 264 pages 6 x 9 9 illus. ISBN 978-0-8122-3944-7 Cloth $59.95s 39.00 ISBN 978-0-8122-0104-8 Ebook $59.95s 39.00 World Rights Literature Short copy: Reading through influential texts of the later Middle Ages, Adams shows how specific representations of chess encoded concerns about political organization, civic community, and individual autonomy.

Endgames with kings, bishops, knights, and pawns are generally considered among the most complex and can seem quite bewildering to improving players. This is hardly surprising given that even Grandmasters have been known to struggle in some areas of these endgames, with some examples resulting in embarrassing failure to deliver elementary checkmates In this user-friendly book, Grandmaster and notable endgame authority John Emms begins with the absolute fundamentals of minor piece endings. This slowly but surely arms readers with the essential knowledge and confidence to move onto slightly trickier positions. Using examples from practical play, Emms highlights the correct procedures as well as the typical mistakes made by both attacker and defender. As is normal with the famed Starting Out series, there are an abundance of notes, tips, and warnings throughout the book to help improving players. Starting Out: Minor Piece Endgames is perfect for those who have previously honed their chess skills with the earlier books Starting Out in Chess, Tips for Young Players and Improve Your Endgame Play.
Key features:
*Covers all crucial minor piece endings
*Easy step-by-step guide to better endgame play
*Ideal for improving players
*User-friendly layout to help readers absorb the key ideas

These 60 complete games, annotated throughout, emphasize Cuban master's elegant, classic, accurate, lethal endgame play against Alekhine, Lasker, Marshall, Nimzowitsch, Réti, the best. Here are real games from match and tournament play, but endings that seem like long-contemplated works of art.

For fans of The Queen's Gambit, this is the real life story of a female chess champion travelling the world to compete in a male-dominated sport with the most famous players of all time. Jennifer Shahade, a two-time US women's chess champion, spent her teens and twenties travelling the world playing chess. Tournaments have taken her from Istanbul to Moscow, and introduced her to players from Zambia to China. In this ultra male-dominated sport, Jennifer found shocking sexism, as well as an incredible history of the top female players that has often been ignored. But she also found friendships, feminism and hope. Through her own story as well as in-depth profiles of pioneers of the game, Jennifer invites us into the extremely competitive world of chess. She shows us the rivalry and the camaraderie; the ecstatic highs and the excruciating losses; the glamour and the hard work. She describes the coach who told her that her period will affect her standard of play, and gives us thrilling blow-by-blow accounts of the matches that made history. Intertwined with Jennifer's own story are those of the top female players from around the world. We meet the famous Polgar sisters, the three Hungarian girls who were all child prodigies; we meet the glamorous jet setters who travel the world partying, and the players who escaped war-torn countries to become champions against the odds. Chess Queens is a fascinating journey into the exhilarating world of chess and an essential book for all the aspiring chess queens of today.

This series provides an ideal platform to study chess openings. By continually challenging the reader to answer probing questions throughout the book, the Move by Move format greatly encourages the learning and practising of vital skills just as much as the traditional assimilation of opening knowledge. Carefully selected questions and answers are designed to keep you actively involved and allow you to monitor your progress as you learn. This is an excellent way to study any chess opening and at the same time improve your general chess skills and knowledge. ----- The Catalan is a solid opening system in which White combines the Queen's Gambit with a kingside fianchetto. In recent years it has become an increasingly popular choice at all levels of chess, and elite grandmasters such as Vladimir Kramnik have developed major new ideas for both White and Black. The Catalan can lead to a wide variety of positions, open or closed, tactical or strategic, that will suit players of all styles. In this book, Grandmaster Neil McDonald invites you to join him in studying the Catalan and its many variations. McDonald shares his experience and knowledge of the Catalan, examines the main plans for both sides and provides answers to the key questions. ----- * Essential guidance and training with the Catalan --- * Important ideas absorbed by continued practice --- * Utilizes an ideal approach to chess study

The Chigorin Defence (1 d4 d5 2 c4 Nc6) is a dynamic and provocative response to White's 1 d4. Rather than set out a defensive stall with systems based on moves such as ...e6 and ...c6, Black prefers to initiative immediate piece play in the centre. The benefits of this strategy are that Black's queenside pieces, which are often difficult to develop in the Queen's Gambit, participate in the struggle at once. The queen's knight emerges immediately onto an active square and the path is left free for the c8-bishop to develop freely. Naturally there are also drawbacks as Black will not find it easy to establish a foothold in the centre in the early play. The Chigorin is a perfect counterattacking weapon and will appeal to players who like to throw opponents onto their own resources at an early stage. Jimmy Liew identifies and analyses the precise moments when specific theoretical knowledge is required and also discussed plans and strategies in the quieter variations. * Everything you need to know to play the Chigorin with confidence * Emphasis on plans and strategies * Written by an expert in the opening

Emanuel Lasker was world champion for a remarkable 27 years (1894-1921) and is generally regarded as having been way ahead of his time in his understanding of chess. He primarily regarded chess as a fight and considered that the strongest move in a position was the one that created greatest problems for the opponent and not necessarily the one that was objectively "best". His strengths included: ----- * His skill at accumulating small advantages with quiet manoeuvring. --- * His astonishing ability to find tactical resources in defence. --- * His uncanny knack of provoking errors in balanced positions. ----- Lasker was, essentially, a complete chessplayer and his games feel thoroughly modern. Indeed many contemporary elite players (the most obvious one being the current world champion Magnus Carlsen) exhibit a very similar style. ----- The Move by Move series provides an ideal format for the keen chessplayer to improve their game. While reading you are continually challenged to answer probing questions - a method that greatly encourages the learning and practising of vital skills just as much as the traditional assimilation of chess knowledge. Carefully selected questions and answers are designed to keep you actively involved and allow you to monitor your progress as you learn. This is an excellent way to study chess while providing the best possible chance to retain what has been learnt.