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Finished My 60 Memorable Games today. It was a blast.

I don't know how easy some of these might be to get hold of since I haven't played much in the last 15 years or so (got married - had kids!)

Paul Motwani's books H.O.T. Chess, C.O.O.L. Chess and S.T.A.R Chess are all pretty entertaining

I used to have a rule of thumb that Karpov books were better than Kasparov's simply because there was much less "crunching" type analysis and more emphasis on explaining strategic ideas.

Finally some of the older game collection books are usually good. Mainly because players who played 50+ years ago tended to win using a particular strategic theme which these days would be spotted and avoided. I used to have books on Tarrasch, Smyslov and Larsen which were particularly good for this.

Starting on Kotov's "Think Like a Grandmaster," using the time-honored tradition of going with whatever book someone recommended to me most recently upon finishing the last one.

The son (or song) of sorrow. It is a benoni opening book...never seen such a detailed book with a ton of pictures...a please to read on an offbeat opening.

I feel that "Think like a Grandmaster" is a bit overrated.

Most helpful: HTRYC
Most stylistically influential: Art of Attack
When I used to study chess like a madman (bobjoejim can attest) I began each morning with a downloaded set of Bobby Fischer's 60 on auto-play running on Winboard while I ate breakfast. GL

I would strongly recommend How to Reassess your Chess to anyone with a limited experience of the game.

Chess for Tigers by Simon Webb is another classic that i really like.

Hey all,

Total newbie here and also interested in novice books on iBooks or Kindle. I literally know how the pieces move and that's basically it.

Also, in a book like "The Amateur's Mind", are you supposed to be able to go through the algebraic notation and just have a mental picture as you go through it? Seems what the lack of diagrams implies but I can't imagine how people do that...

The lack of diagrams implies you should use a board (or just skip the parts with no diagrams if you are not using one) Novice books is a tough question, I don't know if there is some book considered clearly the best, especially an iBook/Kindle one. Some novice/beginner books that seem interesting:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Build-your-C.../dp/1906552010
http://www.amazon.com/Comprehensive-...dp/1889323233/

Anyone read Endgame Tactics by Van Perlo? It was recommended to me by a GM, curious whether anyone of you have used it.

It's a nice book, I have used it more as bedside reading than a learning tool though. I guess it could have learning value as well

Does anyone have "World's Most Instructive Amateur Game Book" (strange title btw): http://www.mongoosepress.com/index.p...-book&catid=38 Heisman seems to be held in high regard around here so I'd expect that to be good.

edit: the excerpt seems very promising, I knew i was going to like it from the first paragraphs

That's dedication

can't get sleep unless i read/watch something with the right level of boring

I just picked up Silman's Complete Endgame Course and am loving it so far. Silman is such a good writer, he really does make difficult concepts easy to understand.

I have had Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual for a few years, but find it much too dense and daunting. However, I do look stuff up in it from time-to-time.

I'm a USCF 2000 player and am always looking to improve, anyone have any recs on other endgame books?

My System
Art of Attack - Vukovic
Art of the Middle-Game, esp the Chapter on Defending a tough position
Pawn Structure Chess by Soltis
Chess Fundamentals by Capa
Chess of Bobby Fischer ~ Burger [other games mentioned also]
2 Vol Set on Middlegames by Euwe
Art of Defense by Soltis
if you play the Sicilian, the Labyrinth books by Polugaevsky
almost any of Nunn's books, esp his best game collection
The Art of Planning in Chess

and of course any top game collection:
1) Soltis top 100
2) Alekhine's best games
3) Tal's best games
4) My 60 Memorable games


I felt reading the Italics had the best impact on my play. Fischer's games....so clean! So simple! So classical!

Every time I play over one of the drawn GM rook endings that Rubinstein won, I feel like he could have been convicted of witchcraft. In 1960. Or today.

#1 GOAT - Akiba
Capa
Smyslov/Karpov

The Rotlewi win is a top 10 game/combination/Q+R sac ever. But this R+P endgame v Lasker:
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1119726

His position is worth maybe 2/3 of a pawn better after 23-24 moves, Lasker has to resign by move 40.

I'm sure we could find 5 better examples if we tried.

I have Chess Fundamentals by Capablanca.
I will start to read the book... is a little bit old, was one of my grandfather books.

will be picking th karpov soon to learn some new stuff

So the biggest thing that dissuades me from really getting down to read a chess book is that I have to set up the positions again and again. Surely there are books out there on iBooks that have some kind of insert/diagram that lets you play through the position instead of having to do it manually.

Any recommendations on this front?

I'm still a weak player, so nothing too advanced (think 1100 on chess.com).

someone should make a chess book collection for the DS or something for just that purpose

DS?

www.forwardchess.com worth a look. Heisman's book might be what you're after.

I've also seen numerous websites that have pgn files that include all the positions and variations from various commonly recommended books, so you can follow along on your computer as you read the book.

Of the ones I've found, there are a *couple* that actually look like they *might* be legitimate (ie not copyright violations), but none that I'm sure of, so I don't have anything specific that I feel I can link.