Our Coming Soon section has some new additions. We will say more about the books later, but for now a brief introduction.
The Anand Files – The World Championship Story 2008-2012. Michiel Abeln tells the inside story of Anand’s dramatic World Championship matches against Kramnik, Topalov and Gelfand. Abeln extensively interviewed Anand’s seconds about their experiences. The ideal expert to state an opinion on the book is Viswanathan Anand, who writes in the Foreword: “Basically, I love this book. The level of detail is fabulous, and as I read it I felt I was reliving the entire five-year period during which these three matches happened.”
Small Steps 2 Success by Sam Shankland. The 2018 US Champion and double Olympiad gold medallist follows up his excellent Small Steps to Giant Improvement with a work about passed pawns. I am biased as ever, but this is top-notch instruction. The cover above is Version B, for those who followed the previous debate.
Alma and the Dark Dominion by Judit Berg. A new area for us – fiction. Judit Berg is an award-winning, bestselling children’s author from Hungary. Alma is a fun adventure story that has some chess content supplied by Judit Polgar.
Yesterday I worked on the cover of Sam’s next book, Small Steps 2 Success. As someone who has been teaching Maths and Physics for years, I know how I am supposed to draw this. But what makes sense in my former world, doesn’t mean it’s the best-looking cover. So, I would like to hear your opinions on which cover you like most. I know, small changes, but that’s what makes a difference after all!?
Our new books, Opening Simulator – KID by Lund and Hagen, and The Nemesis by Efim Geller are printed and being posted to those who have bought them on our website.
While we were printing, we took the chance to reprint some other books that had been out of stock in either paperback or hardcover. So The Catalan by Boris Avrukh and The King’s Gambit, by me, are now available again in both formats. Above is a photo of the newly reprinted, and ridiculously heavy, hardcover of The King’s Gambit. In case you are wondering, that seam along the middle of the spine is not damage – our hardbacks are wrapped in plastic so they arrive in pristine condition.
GM Rausis has been declared caught by FIDE’s anti-cheating commission. Essentially with a phone in the toilets. It is my understanding that there is a clear admission of guilt. (read more on Chess24).
His six year rise to 2685 thus comes to a halt. Apparently you cannot go from no. 500 in the World to no. 50 in your 50s after all. Or at least not in this case.
We can expect him to get a 5-10 year ban, as life-time bans are not allowed under CAS.
This is of course if he is convicted by the Ethics Commission.
We cannot expect the police to get involved. There was a big US case of cheating in a major sport where they failed to get the police involved. And when my shed was burgled last year, the police did everything by email.
Here are my questions:
Do you find it appropriate of FIDE to announce an alleged cheaters name and indeed guilt in the way it has been done?
Do you have personal experience with cheating happening against you?
Do you think FIDE should roll the dice with relation to statistical accusations, such as Aldama in Chicago Open 2018, despite CAS in general rejecting statistical evidence. In case you do not know of this case, you can see the following game, where 16.a4/a3 and 22.Nd2/d3 shows a problem with the signalling process, rather than deviation from the source of the moves, Stockfish on Chess24. (And yes, I would love to be sued by Mr Aldama for him to clear his name. You can check his other games in the same tournament for corroboration).
We are continuing our free-fourth-book offer – if you buy three books or more and live in the normal European Union zone (as defined by UPS – for example, they exclude some islands and remote areas) we will send you an extra book free.
Please note that if you buy a Special Offer and are in the EU zone, we will add one free book. For example, if a European buys the Special Offer on our award-winning Grandmaster Preparation series, then we would send the 6 hardcovers, plus one free extra book.
The previous default option on the free book was Grandmaster Battle Manual. For July and August we will switch the default option to TACTIMANIA. But if you already have that book, or would prefer a different free book, then send us an email to salesgroup@qualitychess.co.uk with your order, asking to have it replaced with one of the following titles:
ATTACKING THE SPANISH CARLSEN’S ASSAULT ON THE THRONE CHAMPIONS OF THE NEW MILLENNIUM CUTTING EDGE 1: THE OPEN SICILIAN CUTTING EDGE 2: SICILIAN NAJDORF 6.Be3 GRANDMASTER BATTLE MANUAL GRANDMASTER VERSUS AMATEUR POSITIONAL CHESS SACRIFICES REGGIO EMILIA 2007/2008 THE ALTERMAN GAMBIT GUIDE – WHITE GAMBITS THE ALTERMAN GAMBIT GUIDE – BLACK GAMBITS VOLUME 1 THE ALTERMAN GAMBIT GUIDE – BLACK GAMBITS VOLUME 2 SAN LUIS 2005
We have sent to the printer Opening Simulator – King’s Indian Defence by Esben Lund and Andreas Skytte Hagen. You can read an excerpt here. We are predicting a publication date of the end of July or the first week of August – printing time can vary.
This is a new style of book for us. It’s an opening book. And it’s a puzzle book. The excerpt explains the idea. In fact, it’s a tricky book to represent in an excerpt, as the book also includes a long introduction (about 80 pages) about standard plans and ideas in the King’s Indian. But we did not include any of that Introduction in the excerpt as chopping a little out of a coherent whole did not work for us.
If you are familiar with Esben Lund’s previous books – most recently, Sharp Endgames and The Secret Life of Bad Bishops – you will know that a huge effort goes into research for his books. And if anything the addition of a co-author, Andreas Skytte Hagen, has allowed an even more ambitious book. So if the King’s Indian Defence interests you, for either colour, then have a look and see what you think.
We have been keeping our heads down, trying to finish books. And the results are on the way. I will say more tomorrow, but for today we have an excerpt of The Nemesis – Geller’s Greatest Games.
This is a big book – 480 pages. And it’s the first time all Efim Geller’s annotations of his own games have been published in English. Some have been in English before, but Russian Chess House gathered many Russian-language sources, including two books and many magazines, to create the definitive complete collection. Our new book is an original English translation of that work.
As is our normal practice with non-opening books, we will release this book first in hardcover only. The predicted publication date is July 31. I hope you enjoy the book.
We have updated our excerpt to The Sicilian Taimanov. It now includes an Abridged Variation Index to give a clearer idea of the content. If you have downloaded the excerpt before, you may have to refresh your browser to see the new one.
And when will this book be published? Our printer is on holiday today, so I don’t know exactly when the books will be available. But first week in June is a good guess.
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