In his excellent Checkpoint column at Chesscafe, FM Carsten Hansen gives Sabino Brunello’s Attacking the Spanish a 5/5 review.
However, Quality Chess does get some criticism for being too pushy with our author:
“The back cover tell us that the author “is one of the leaders of the youthful revival in Italian chess” and that he “is still a teenager, but his rating is already 2550 and increasing daily. By the time this book is printed he will probably be a grandmaster.” This is an odd embellishment to say the least. A quick check on FIDE’s website shows that he has yet to become a grandmaster (at least the title hasn’t been awarded yet) and his rating is down. However, the poorly worded promotion was completely unnecessary, because he is already a stronger player than most authors today.”
You can fairly accuse us of pushing our book and our author. We are terribly proud of both, especially as Sabino is also my student. However, when we send a book to the printer in June, please do not have a go at us for not predicting that the author might lose rating points in August! (And sadly September too.) Sabino has two norms and is a very strong player. He will be a GM the moment he makes the third norm. This can happen at any moment, for example at the World Juniors in Argentina in October.
I for one have come to appreciate your ‘curteously belligerent’ style Jacob!
Your willingness to publicly disagree with customers and critics alike is refreshing in this day of political correctness and false politeness!