From Tactics to Strategy-Winning Knowledge

This is the second book of the Thinkers' Chess Academy series. In the first book we started at a beginner´s level with checkmates in 1, 2 or 3 moves and the most common tactical motifs. If you have already worked with the first book you will now be much more experienced and ready for some more difficult lessons.

We will start with 50 combinations to refresh our memory of the motifs from the first book. The chess friends who have not read the first book can treat it as a kind of self test. If you cannot solve many of the examples it may be better to go back and work through the first book again. It's not a good idea to leave basic knowledge out. It will certainly hinder your progress if you do so.

The Powerful Impact of Engines

This book is dedicated to chess, though I must confess it is not that same chess with which I immediately and eternally fell in love many, many years ago. There were plenty of wonderful moments, and no shortage of horrible disappointments associated with that version of the game in which I certainly considered myself a true professional.

A Practical Guide to a Vital Skill in Chess

Most chess games of beginners and post-beginners are decided by fairly straightforward tactics. Anyone who wants to progress beyond this level and become a strong club player or a candidate master, needs to understand that somewhat mysterious-looking resource, the positional sacrifice.

International Master Merijn van Delft has studied and loved positional sacrifices for as long as he can remember. This non-forcing tool is not just a surprising and highly effective way of creating a decisive advantage during a game. Positional sacrifices are also instruments of superior beauty.

Rare Ideas for White

Aus dem Vorwort:

Thank you for taking the time to read this book. This work is a follow-up to my first book ?Unconventional Approaches to Modern Chess ? Rare Ideas for Black? which was published in February 2019. This time, I am flipping the board and exploring offbeat opening ideas from White?s perspective. The structure of the book has remained basically the same as before, except that I merged Part III (Showing Ambitions) and Part IV (Early Surprises) into one combined chapter Ambitions & Surprises.
 

Entscheidungsfindung - Angriff und Verteidigung

Aus dem Vorwort von Mark Dvoretsky:
"Dieses Buch ist eine Sammlung von sorgfältig kommentierten Partien. Ich habe versucht, deren Kern zu entdecken und will Ihnen, so lebendig wie möglich, Ideen aufzeigen, die Ihr Schachspiel verbessern können. Ich hoffe, dass das Buch nicht nur für hochrangige Schachspieler hilfreich sein wird, sondern auch für Leser, die verstehen wollen, wie Großmeister und Meister am Brett Probleme angehen und lösen, was die Gründe für Fehler sind und wie man diese Fehler vermeiden kann.
Der zweite Teil befasst sich mit den Problemen von Angriff und Verteidigung."

Mark Dvoretsky (1947-2016) wurde in Moskau geboren. Er war Internationaler Meister, Verdienter Trainer der UdSSR, von Russland und Georgien, und FIDE Seniortrainer. Zu Recht galt er als einer der besten Trainer der Welt. Mehrere seiner Schüler wurden starke Großmeister: u.a. S. Dolmatov, A. Jussupow, A. Dreev, V. Zvjagintsev, E. Inarkiev. Mark Dvoretsky ist auch ein außerordentlich erfolgreicher Buchautor. Für seine Bücher "Die Endspieluniversität" und ..Tragikomödien im Endspiel" erhielt er 2010 von der FIDE die Boleslavsky Medaille.

ELO 1600 - 2000

Like other titles in the Training Program for Chess Players series, this volume is both an excellent textbook for independent study and a powerful teaching aid for chess coaches. In the view of many experts, no better work of this kind has ever been written.

Der Autor dieses Buchs - Artur Jussupow - wurde 1960 in Moskau geboren, ist Großmeister seit 1980 und FIDE Senior Trainer seit 2005. Seine bedeutendsten Schacherfolge sind: Jugend Weltmeister 1977; drei mal im Halbfinale der Weltmeisterschaft (1986, 1989, 1992); zweimal Europa-, einmal Weltmeister und 5-facher Olympiasieger mit der Sowjetischen Mannschaft, Deutscher Meister 2005 und Europa Rapid Meister 2005.

Auschlussmethode & Fallenspiel

Manchmal ist es sehr schwer, alle Folgen des geplanten Zugs zu berechnen, aber es ist oft auch nicht nötig! Viel einfacher ist es, sich zu überzeugen, dass unser Zug sinnvoll ist, keine sofortige Widerlegung hat und alle anderen Züge dagegen schlecht oder wenigstens deutlich schwächer sind. Schließlich sparen wir damit Zeit und überzeugen uns gleichzeitig, dass unsere Entscheidung richtig ist. Solch eine Methode, Entscheidungen zu treffen, kann man "Ausschlussmethode" nennen.

How to Save Points from Lost Positions

Chess is a cruel game. We all know that feeling when your position has gone awry and everything seems hopeless. You feel like resigning. But don’t give up! This is precisely the moment to switch to swindle mode.

Master the art of provoking errors and you will be able to turn the tables and escape with a draw – or sometimes even steal the full point!

Practical Chess Exercises: Tactics, Strategy ..

Viktor Moskalenko is one of the leading chess instructors of our time. Not only has he coached Masters and Grandmasters, including Ukrainian star Vassily Ivanchuk, he has also taught hundreds of classes for amateurs and his best-selling books have inspired thousands of ambitious club players all over the world.

Two great books from the Everyman Chess Library, Play Unconventional Chess and Win by Noam A. Manellla and Zeev Zohar and Break the Rules! A Modern Look at Chess Strategy by Neil McDonald, brought together in one volume.

Today’s young players have benefited greatly from working with chess computers. There is little doubt that advanced software and electronic training programs have significantly contributed to the rise of the standards of play.

But there is a negative side to this. Many young chess players see the computer as the ultimate response to nearly everything. They think that computer analysis is the best and the fastest way to find the truth in any position on the board.

The Cunning Cavalry

The Power of the Pieces

In his ground-breaking series, The Power of the Pieces, Belorussian grandmaster Sergey Kasparov examines the strengths, weaknesses and overall characteristics of each piece on the chessboard. This second volume in the series is about the knight. Its role in the opening, middlegame and endgame is discussed in detail, amply supported by almost 140 complete games from tournament praxis.

I may be old-fashioned, but I keep using for my inspiration the treasure of the past. It does not make sense to speculate whether, for instance, Carlsen is stronger than Fischer or Korchnoi, as matches between players separated in time by so many decades are impossible. But this book aims to prove that some of the basic aspects of our game did not change over the generations.