This is a temporary post. We were talking about the upcoming World Cup and got a bit excited to be honest. So we decided to have a little competition. We are working on the questions at the moment. They will be available Tuesday morning at some point. The deadline for entry will be 1 hour before the start of the first round on Friday.
Look out for more details here tomorrow.
Do you know what you will be doing for the next six months? We do. The real question will be if we can do everything as fast as we want. For example: Boris Gelfand constantly gets all these annoying tournament invitations that distracts him from the book…
We do not really have dates for anything else than the Dragon books, published next, but I can give a few informal updates.
The next volume on 1.e4 vs the Sicilian is only a few weeks from going to the printer. It could theoretically be out late October. The Razuvaev book is far progressed as well. But most importantly, John has made great progress on the Playing 1.e4 books. I think the first one will be out in November and the second not long after. We considered publishing them together, but it did not really make a lot of sense to wait with one, while the other one is finalised. So, they will be out a few months apart.
| Gawain Jones | The Dragon Volume 1 | 9 September 2015 |
| Gawain Jones | The Dragon Volume 2 | 9 September 2015 |
| John Shaw | Playing 1.e4 – Caro-Kann, 1…e5 & Minor Lines | Autumn |
| Yuri Razuvaev | Key Concepts of Gambit Play | Autumn |
| Parimarjan Negi | GM Rep – 1.e4 vs The Sicilian II | Autumn |
| GERMAN | Vom GM zur Top Ten – Judit Polgar 2 | Autumn |
| Vassilios Kotronias | GM6A – Beating the Anti-Sicilians | Autumn |
| Nikos Ntirlis | Playing 1.e4 e5 – A Classical Repertoire | Winter |
| Ftacnik (Aagaard) | GM6B – The Najdorf | Winter |
| Victor Mikhalevski | GM Rep 19 – Beating Minor Openings | Winter |
| Boris Avrukh | GM Repertoire 1B – 1.d4 The Queen’s Gambit | Winter |
| GERMAN | Dame am Brett – Judit Polgar 3 | Winter |
| John Shaw | Playing 1.e4 – Sicilian & French | Winter |
| Tibor Karolyi | Mikhail Tal’s best games 3 – The Invincible | Winter |
| Boris Gelfand | Dynamic Decision Making in Chess | Winter |
| Vassilios Kotronias | King’s Indian – Volume 4 | Winter |
| Vassilios Kotronias | King’s Indian – Volume 5 | Winter |
Most of chess publishing is long hard work for very little money. A few thousand copies is what a chess book sells and there are many who want a slice of the cake. Retailers need to make a living, so there goes half the money. Outside the chess specialists, there is a requirement for middlemen, who take a third of what is left. Then there are transport, storage, printing, handling, editing, graphics, internet, rent, equipment, employees and not least, authors!
It is not a surprise that it took more than half a decade for us to make a small profit…
If you feel any sympathy for us at all, buy your Quality Chess books through a chess specialist shop. They not only provide you with the service of going to tournaments as well as having a store, they are also the backbone of our industry. Without them, there would be no chess books at all…
One thing we are doing in order to support the chess specialists is to publish hardback versions of our books and only sell them through the specialist network. These high quality books cost approximately €5 more than their inferior paperback cousins. They stay open when you put them on the table and provide a much nicer experience all-round.
The most recent example of this is Boris Gelfand’s Positional Decision Making in Chess, which at this moment in time is only available on Forward Chess and in high quality hardback. Usually this should reduce sales a bit; as many will be waiting for the cheaper version of the book (coming out early 2016 most likely), but it seems not in this case.
We are looking at a reprint within a week or so, which is an excellent change for me to ask if you have noticed any mistakes we should correct for the next version? We have found about 8 very minor things, but as no book is ever perfect (or close to it), I am sure there are more. We will be very interested in hearing your thoughts.
Meanwhile, Boris is doing a good job of promoting the book: http://www.uschess.org/content/view/13166/141/
We have been through this one a few times, but I just thought I wanted to run this one past the pollsters…
There are those who do not believe in talent for chess, and there are those who think that talent is everything. Clearly the truth is somewhere in-between. I remember someone on Facebook saying that there is no special talent for chess, only to be told by Peter Heine Nielsen that he knew a Norwegian guy with quite a bit of talent…
Obviously talent without work is poorer than work without talent. But with equal amounts of work, how much does talent add to your abilities?
Rating polls
The final of the three polls about rating makes more sense to view together with the two previous polls. Please draw your own conclusions!
Let us ignore the fantasy that you abandon your job, leave your wife and go on the road with Artur Yusupov and Boris Avrukh perfecting your chess, and just assume that life will continue as you are planning it.
What do you think is the highest rating you can reach? Please be honest.
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Last week’s poll showed a clear majority to the optimists:
I am an optimistic guy, I believe that I will write a better chess book than I have done up till now. I believe that 2015 will be the best year for Quality Chess so far (and the publications we have out so far have been received in a way that makes this optimism persist). I believe I can make it to the first team at the tennis club next year and that I can one day make it to the finals in the club championship.
But I doubt that I will ever play chess as well as I did in 2007. Or in other words – although I understand the game much better now, I have lost something extra I had then. Maybe it was the excitement of knowing that I would become a GM in the near future, or something else.
What about you? Is your best chess behind you or ahead of you?
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The results of last week’s poll:
We are trying to get a picture of our readership on this blog over the summer and in that connection we will ask a number of questions about you. Please answer only once in the week and forgive us for being in holiday mode and only doing a full analytical article at the end of the summer.
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Last week’s poll about what type of tournaments you prefer to play in produced a balanced response:
The Politiken Cup in Denmark is my favourite tournament. And so it should be, not only is it held in beautiful locations, with all the participants staying in the same place (view over the ocean), it is also in Denmark, where I have strong ties obviously.
Yes, they pay me to play there. I even win a few hundred pounds once in a while…
But for others, participating is easily running into £1000 when you include entry fee, accommodation, eating and buying Quality Chess books at the stand. There is no way around it if you are not Danish, as the tournament is held quite a bit from, well anywhere…
What is your view. Do you prefer a cheap and cheerful tournament or a luxury event like this?
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The results of last week’s poll offers some encouragement to chess publishers:
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