Attacking Manuals 1 and 2 – Jacob Aagaard
Champions of the New Millennium – Lubomir Ftacnik, Danny Kopec, Walter Browne
Chess Duels: My Games with the World Champions – Yasser Seirawan
Nunn’s Chess Endings Volume 1 – John NunnDetails below …
Attacking Manuals 1 and 2
Jacob Aagaard
Quality Chess pp 260
Volume 1 £23.99, pp 462 Volume 2 £23.99.
With the publication of volume 2 the author completes a project which has taken him 7 years to complete and as he writes, “fulfilled a personal ambition”. These comprehensive volumes are one of the few that can compare favourably with Dvoretsky’s manuals. This is a volume which is intended for the serious student. An excellent innovation is the provision of study positions before the main body of the text discusses them so the reader obtains maximum benefit from his efforts. But the book can also be enjoyed as a wonderful collection of attacking games and positions. The lay out and presentation is excellent.
Champions of the New Millennium
Lubomir Ftacnik, Danny Kopec, Walter Browne
Quality Chess pp 449
£19.99
Described in the blurb as “the ideal guide to who’s who in modern chess” this substantial volume is just that: the eighteen best chess players in the world split between established stars and the players likely to dominate in the next decade with Judit Polgar and Gata Kamsky making up the numbers. Each player has a chapter outlining their history, an analysis of their playing style and four of their best games deeply annotated. The experienced authors have shared the work between them. Beautifully produced with (as so often with Quality Chess) numerous exceptional photographs, this volume is a fine introduction to the leading players of our time.
Chess Duels – My Games with the World Champions
Yasser Seirawan
Everyman Chess pp 425
£20.00
The basis of the book is as described: very personal annotations of the 40 games Seirawan played between 1989 and 2000 against the world champions in which he scored a very creditable 181/2 points out of 40. However the book is much more than that, as the author discusses the history of the world championship over the last 20 or so years with many shrewd observations on the personalities he met along the way. Written in a relaxed style this book is an easy read, not something that can be said about many chess books. The hard back volume is beautifully produced and printed by Everyman.
Nunn’s Chess Endings Volume 1
John Nunn pp319 Gambit
£17.99
In this volume, which concentrates on endings without rooks, Nunn analyses what he calls “concrete endings” ie those where the outcome can be determined by precise calculation. The examples are instructive and often illustrate that the normal endgame “rules” eg outside passed pawn wins, do not always apply. A basic knowledge of chess endings is assumed but anyone with that background cannot fail to improve his endgame play by studying this book, which is also a valuable contribution to endgame theory.
– Ray Edwards Julian Farrand David Friedgood – 23rd August 2010