NEW GAMBIT CHESS BOOKS
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Now available
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The Najdorf Sicilian has a unique place amongst chess
openings: for several decades it has been regarded by the top grandmasters as
the best way for Black to play soundly for a win against 1 e4. It was a
particular favourite of World Champions Bobby Fischer and Garry Kasparov, and
plays a vital role in the repertoires of current top players such as
Viswanathan Anand and Veselin Topalov.
Black's stance is totally uncompromising. He accepts no
organic weaknesses and stays flexible, ready to counterpunch in any part of the
board. White has no safe or easy option. On the other hand, he does have a vast
array of extremely dangerous attacking options, such as the old 6 Bg5 main
line, which can lead to the Poisoned Pawn, a variation that has undergone much
development in the 21st century. The current main line is 6 Be3, intending the
English Attack. But given the Najdorf's importance, White has tried almost
everything imaginable in the search for an advantage, with considerable bodies
of theory evolving for lines that contain merely a drop of poison.
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In this major two-volume work, renowned endgame
theoretician John Nunn teaches the skills that are most important to success in
practical endgames.
Going beyond standard texts, Dr Nunn shows how to apply
knowledge of standard endgames to find the right methods in tricky real-life
practical situations - even when they differ greatly from the idealized forms
given by traditional endgame manuals.
Nunn shows that lack of familiarity with key ideas can cause
important ideas and themes to be missed even by very strong players. We
discover that a staggering amount of previously published endgame analysis is
simply wrong, and that many of the standard guidelines are at best partially
true.
This first volume covers general topics and discusses in
detail pawn endings, queen endings and minor-piece endings.
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In this highly-acclaimed series, John Watson helps
chess-players achieve a more holistic and insightful view of the openings. He
explains not only the ideas and strategies behind specific openings, but also
the interconnections of chess openings taken as a whole. By presenting the
common threads that underlie opening play, Watson provides a permanent basis
for playing openings of any type.
This final volume draws together many themes in a
wide-ranging discussion of general opening topics. By looking at familiar
situations from new angles, Watson helps us greatly increase our understanding
of them. In the process, he covers a wide variety of opening structures and
variations not seen in the earlier volumes and presents a great wealth of
original analysis.
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Bored with the same old openings? Worried about having to
learn too much theory? Then this book will come as a godsend. Aaron Summerscale
presents a set of exceptionally dangerous opening weapons for White. Each
recommended line is based on a solid positional foundation, yet also promises
long-term (and short-term!) attacking chances. The variations are not just easy
to learn and play, but they also set Black complex problems.
For this new edition, the publishers enlisted the help of
hotshot opening writer Sverre Johnsen, who has updated the coverage where
necessary, while retaining the spirit, charm and aims of Summerscale's original
work. The killer repertoire remains easy to learn, and is now more dangerous
than ever!
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The Marshall Attack is a chess opening like no other. Rather
than subjecting himself to the 'Spanish torture' so typical in the Ruy Lopez,
Black simply gives away a centre pawn. But in return, he gets long-term
attacking chances and activity that can persist well into the endgame.
It is almost a century since Frank Marshall invented his
sensational gambit, but it is still controversial, and more popular than ever
amongst the best players in the world. In their hands, the Marshall Attack
looks remarkably solid - even if White neutralizes Black's attacking chances
and remains a pawn up, Black often achieves full positional
compensation.
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Tactical skills are paramount in chess. More than anything
else, a player's ability to find tactical solutions determines how successful
he is over-the-board. No endgame scheme, opening idea or strategic plan,
however brilliant a concept it may be, is of any value unless it is accurately
calculated and implemented.
The best way to develop tactical skills is to practise them
by tackling new and challenging positions. This book provides a wealth of chess
puzzles to test just about every facet of your tactical ability. It is very
unlikely that even those who have read many other chess puzzle books will
recognize more than a handful of these positions. Franco has searched recent
events and used powerful computers to seek out previously unpublished puzzles,
and has also drawn extensively upon Latin American sources that he has been
scouring for brilliant examples over the last three decades.
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The advice frequently given to chess-players eager to
improve their results is straightforward: study tactics! But there is often
little useful guidance as to how this is best done. By solving puzzle
positions? Or endgame studies? By dissecting the games of great tacticians?
Few books present a structured approach to tactics, so this
book fills a valuable niche in the ambitious player's library. The authors
present each major tactical theme in turn, explaining how it works and
providing inspiring examples. They then explain how you can spot the idea in
your own games and use it to your advantage. You immediately get a chance to
put your knowledge to the test, as there are challenging exercises throughout
the whole book, with detailed solutions.
The second part of the book offers more advanced material,
and takes us inside the professional's tactics laboratory. Here we see how
tactical themes are combined, and employed to achieve strategic goals. We are
also shown how grandmasters spot the targets for their breathtaking
combinations, which we thus come to see not as sheer witchcraft, but as the
product of disciplined thought and training.
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* The perfect survival guide to the chess openings
* All
openings covered
* Detailed verbal explanations of plans for both sides
* Up-to-date and featuring many tips and recommendations
* Insights
into the 'character' of each opening
* Written by one of the world's
foremost opening experts
The first moves of a chess game define the nature of the
whole struggle, as both players stake their claim to the critical squares and
start to develop their plans. It is essential to play purposefully and to avoid
falling into traps or reaching a position that you don't understand.
This is not a book that provides masses of variations to
memorize. Paul van der Sterren instead offers a wealth of ideas and
explanation, together with the basic variations of each and every opening. This
knowledge will equip players to succeed in the opening up to good club level,
and provide a superb grounding in opening play on which to build a more
sophisticated repertoire. The strategies he explains will, unlike ever-changing
chess opening theory, remain valid as long as chess is played, and so the time
spent studying this book will be rewarded many times over.
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