Basic Chess Endings

My copy of BCE was printed by Tartan Press, a subdivision of McKay.  McKay currently prints it:

http://www.amazon.com/Basic-Chess-Endings-Reuben-Fine/dp/0679140026

Or maybe this one in algebraic:

http://www.amazon.com/Basic-Chess-Endings-Reuben-Fine/dp/0812934938

I have Rueben Fine, "Basic Chess Endings"  I also have all of the corrections to his solutions that were published in Chess Life & Review and Chess Life in GM Larry Evans article where subscribers would write to him  with those corrections and he would confirm that they were errors, not good corrections, sometimes with additional variations.

I have also verified these corrections with Houdini and where possible with Namilov's endgame tablebases.

I know several masters who worked their way through BCE in the BCE era (before chess engines). They became endgame monsters by making their own corrections (and yeah, it's easy to find many of Fine's mistakes if you look for them). Fine's book is very flawed, especially by today's standard. But he did cover many of the most important positions of the day. 

One apt criticism of his book was "The generalizations were too general, and the specifics were wrong. Other than that, it's a great book!" It's true. And yes, it is indeed a great book. 

But if you want the "right" answers check out Muller and Lamprecht's Fundamental Chess Endings  or that other BCE,  Batsford Chess Endings. Don't even bother to use Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual though, that will require hard work.

I got my endgame start with Fine.  It's an enjoyable book to work through in places but it shouldn't by any means be your only reference.  The guys you'll face at the club and tournaments have likely worked through A Practical Guide to Rook Endings, Secrets of Pawn Endings, the Averbakh series, strategic endgame books, etc. 

It's well known that improving endgame play will bring great results in addition to thought process work. 

A Practical Guide to Rook Endings was done by Minev.  I have his knight vs. bishop, rook vs. minor piece volume and it's more thorough.  It's a 2012 reprint so it's probably more accurate.  Next up is the queen ending volume and then I'd have enough understanding to tackle the ECE. 

Korchnoi has a great endgame book but it's out of print.  Averbakh's series is good as a textbook.  Nunn's Chess Endings 2 I think migh be the closest thing to a reprint of the Korchnoi book.  It's different from the Secrets of Rook Endings in that Secrets of Rook Endings is rook and pawn vs. rook positions specifically.  Sounds very specialized but should be worth it eventually I think.