Quality Chess Newsletter – 4 new books and a Book of the Year vote

 

Dear Quality Chess reader,

Happy New Year to all our chess friends.

At the end of this month we will publish four books.

Chess Evolution 3: Mastery concludes Artur Yusupov’s 9-book educational series. I cannot recommend this series strongly enough for any chess player who wishes to improve. Of course I am biased, but this is universally regarded as a magnificent series. FIDE agreed and awarded Artur the Boleslavsky prize for best instructional books.

Grandmaster Repertoire 13: The Open Spanish by Victor Mikhalevski supplies Black with a complete active repertoire after 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6. The Israeli GM is a world-renowned opening expert, and has played the Open Spanish all his life, so he is the ideal author for this topic.

Attentive readers may spot we have jumped from GM 11 to GM 13. Not to worry – we will publish Grandmaster Repertoire 12: The Modern Benoni next month.

The final two books published on January 31st are the German editions of Jacob’s award-winning Attacking Manuals: Angriffslektionen 1 and Angriffslektionen 2.

Now from books to prizes: the ChessCafe Book of the Year prize is decided by an email vote to info@chesscafe.com by the public – voting is open now and ends on January 21st. There are three books in the final, one of which is Grandmaster Preparation: Calculation by Jacob Aagaard. I would never try to tell our readers which book to vote for – vote for your favourite!

The games section this month (pdf or pgn) contains, among other things, a few of my efforts from the Open section of December’s London Classic. They are offered as entertainment rather than for any educational value. I used to be better than this – honest. For any readers of Christian Bauer’s Play the Scandinavian more important is the correction of a chess typo.

Regards,

John Shaw

Chief Editor

Quality Chess

 

19 thoughts on “Quality Chess Newsletter – 4 new books and a Book of the Year vote”

  1. Gilchrist is a Legend

    With GM13 to be posted on 4th February Monday, and then the publication of GM12 on 28/02/13, with shipping probably 04/03/13(?), then this basically a chance for those who want more aggressive repertoires as Black to choose the Open Spanish and Modern Benoni for both 1. d4 and 1. e4 respectively. A decade ago when I was around 14 to 15, I played the Modern Benoni exclusively for one year due to problems with the King’s Indian, but then quit suddenly without generally too bad results, helping me to win a few weekenders. I had slight problems with the Nge2 lines and the Fianchetto, with which coincidentally I play as White, but not too severe. Maybe this book I will return to this opening that served me quite well.

  2. I agree. John does not get credited enough and he is a very funny man. As well as extremely competent. Our company relies more on him than on me.

  3. @ Jacob

    Really looking forward to the New GM Prep Book – The first two are really fantastic!!

    Just wondered if we would be seeing a new publishing schedule soon? I’m mainly curious about GM Repertoire on the Slav, as I saw this mentioned on the blog some time ago. Please note I’m not demanding an updated schedule and neither do I believe I’m entitled to it, I’m just curious. 🙂

  4. Gilchrist is a Legend

    Two weeks until websales released for GM13, after various books on the Spanish in the chess market on Berlin Wall, Marshall, Chigorin, Zaitsev, this will be a new type of Spanish, I do not remember a book on this opening for a while, especially for a repertoire for Black. All I remember when I played 1. e4 is one of the main lines where Polgar played in a game with Black having pawns on a6/b5/c5/d5. I do not remember who said it, but I remember reading that the Stonewall Dutch was the only opening against 1. d4 that allowed a space advantage for Black in the opening. Perhaps the same for Open Spanish against 1. e4 with that central pawn phalanx?

  5. 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5 3.Nf3 cxd4 4.Nxd4 e5!? is already covered well in “The Alterman Gambit-Guide – Black Gambits 1, but I understand that one would like to see a solution in the GM-Repertoire as well.

    At least the 2nd move alternatives for White are covered in Avrukh´s recent work.

  6. Gilchrist is a Legend

    1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 c5 3. Nf3 is officially an English I think. Avrukh is supposed to do a GM Repertoire on English/Flank/Minor Openings if I remember correctly, so it might be covered there.

    I wonder how many alternative lines for Black are in GM13, because I saw a couple in the excerpt for some of White’s less critical lines.

  7. Is the GM Rep Kings Indian still going ahead? Any news on a publication date? As for post #1, I intend to play the Benoni only after Nf3, e.g. 1. d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3. Nf3 c5; leaving myself the opportunity to enter a Nimzo after 3. Nc3. But then I would need GM Rep 15 Nimzo Indian…….. 😉

  8. @Scorpio5
    We are seriously thinking about a Nimzo-Indian book. Maybe in the GM Guide series. The KID will be going ahead, but will take a very long time before it becomes complete. I recommend to mix it up with other existing repertoires for now.

  9. To me it is strange there are so few Nimzo books from Black’s perspective- indeed for last 10 years. KID plenty (Bologon, Vigirito) – Grunfeld (Chessstars, Avrukh) and Benko too. Emms’ Everyman book is the only serious book I can think of since Gligoric’s book in the 70s/80s.

  10. @Paul
    I think you missed the Nimzo reportoire book ‘Play the Nimzo-Indian’ by Edward Dearing (Everyman), but maybe you didn’t think that was a serious book? And there’s Nimzo-Indian: move by move (Emms).

  11. @Paul

    Edward Deering’s book is a repertoire for Black (2005). You also have the old 1993 or 1994 book by Chess Digest (red cover) that’s a Black Repertoire on the Nimzo and Bogo Indian. Can’t recall author (Tangborn, maybe?)

    Most other Nimzo Books since the 80s have been objective, which to me is the preferred format. You have Carsten Hansen (I think, working off memory) on the 4.e3 Nimzo in 2003/2004. You have Tony Kosten’s old book from 1994, New Ideas in the Nimzo Indian Defense. Gambit’s 112-page, 25 annotated games books series has one on the Nimzo (2009), and my favorite, Sokolov’s recent Nimzo book.

    The only one specifically for White that I know of is Quality Chess. Oops, wait a minute, Gambit has one on 4.f3. But then again, this is why I refuse to stick with just one publisher. If I say “I’m only going to buy Quality Chess Books”, then I’ve eliminated the possibility of playing the Nimzo-Indian as Black (which I don’t anyway) or any line but the Classical or limited 4.e3 coverage from the recent d4 book as White. However, Quality Chess publshed the content that I use to bash the Benko.

    So there’s plenty out there. QC may have the best editors, fewest mistakes, the excellent hardcover format, etc, but there’s plenty out there if you look for it!

    My suggestion, look here first, but if they don’t have it, don’t hessitate to look elsewhere.

  12. I think when only one line is covered, such as in Sokolov or an f3 Gambit book, it is written predominantly with the white player in mind.

    Dearing’s book I forgot – but my point is there is no Nimzo Indian book which comes even close to the standard of the books on the Grunfeld or King’s Indian for the Black player (in my opinion), which is strange. Perhaps the closest is Bologan’s Chessbase dvd from late last year.

  13. @Patrick
    We buy books from all publishers. We care more about the quality of the authors; there are some authors that we don’t really give a shot anymore. And no, I am not going to mention any names…

  14. @Paul
    I agree that there is a need for a GM Reportoire / GM Guide book on the Nimzo (and, for that matter, also on the Queen’s Indian and the QGD). Concerning your comment on Sokolov’s book: I have this book and his book on the Spanish, and in both cases he really is quite objective and thorough i.m.o.

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