I would recommend:
The Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games, Burgess, Nunn, Emms.
You should have at least 1 book of thorough annotations such as this.
I would recommend:
The Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games, Burgess, Nunn, Emms.
You should have at least 1 book of thorough annotations such as this.
How about studying life and death problems from Go(wei-chi)? These will improve your reading skills faster than farting around with conventional chess training: http://tsumego.tasuki.org/?page=tsumego <<<yes they are free here.
Just head on over to Coach Dan Heisman's web site (danheisman.com) and follow his advice and suggested books to read. The opinion of the many time awarded "chess coach of the year" is worth a lot more than anything you will get here.
If you're struggling to come up with a plan in your games i reccomend The Amatuers mind then How To Reassess your chess. After you read those two books then try Art Of Attack.
You can spend a fortune on chess books quickly. I looked back at my chess career and launched a free video lessons course that explains how to get to 2200. It all depends on how much time you have to study. I show you what your priorities should be. It's on YouTube, and linked on the website on my profile. I have a group here at chess.com with over 800 members that has support systemes in place in the forums.
I recommend Simple Chess by Micheal Stean. Simple, very well written and a great selection of master games.
The Vukovic book, Art of Attack in chess, is a book you will not regret buying. The Reshevsky book has a misleading title, it is basically an anotated collection of his games; it is however a good book. |
Rather than throw a list of books in your face, contributing to the already "convoluted" list of names... If I were to start over, I'd begin studying / practicing tactics first, then reading Silman's books about positions, then studying book openings. Silman does a great job explaining imbalances. Measure your success in the beginning by how well you've controlled the board and produced positional gains, instead of straight wins and losses, because your losses will be many. Ugh, it's disheartening how many losses I get, but I think it's getting better.
This means in the beginning phases, you'd be losing tons of games, many times early in the game, because you'd be falling for opening traps, since you haven't studied them first. Because you'll be starting without an understanding of book moves early on, you're forced to utilize principles you've learned to avoid book traps. Understanding tactics is great, but opportunities for tactical ideas are less likely if your position sucks. I chose tactics before openings first, because starting with openings will just overwhelm the starting player like myself, because they often straight up involve memorizing lines, which isn't very stimulating for the beginner. Silman's books showed me what to look for in every position. Yet, studying opening books sets me up for a solid position to maximize tactical opportunities. Understanding Silman before traditional openings is a better approach because, then you'd have a larger context as to what you can do with those openings, once you are playing out of the main lines. Also, understanding the position is better than memorizing lines since you'll be able to adapt to the organic nature of the game, which was why I think it's better to learn about positioning before opening books.
Hey, I'm just a noob in this game, so take this with a grain of salt.
If you haven't studied chess so far, I would consider reading Capablanca's chess fundamentals. It's old, but the fundamentals haven't changed, and Capablanca thinks very logical. While reading, you will continously think: it's so simple, why haven't I seen it, too?
modern books suck.
general treatsies
chess fundamentals - capablanca
modern chess strategy - edward lasker
openings
a guide to chess openings - barden
ideas behind openings - fine
pocket guide to openings - golombek
modern chess openings - korn
openings practice theory - sokolsky
chess opening theory - suetin
middle game
judgement + planning in chess- euwe
art of middle game -keres
my system - nimzovith
modern chess tactics -pachman
art of attack- vukovic
endgame
chess endings-averbach
guide to chess endings -euwe
basic chess endings-fine
pocket guide to endgames- hooper
games anthologies
development of chess style-euwe
selected chess master pieces -gligorich
masters of chessboard - reti
individuals games
my best games 1908-23 - alekhine
my best games 1924-37 - alekhine
my best games 1938-45 - alekhine
tals best games - clarke
60 memorable - fischer
capablancas best games -golombek
early games - keres
middle years -keres
later years - keres
selected games - larsen
best games - smyslov
Thank you very much for your responses.
I've added Bronstein's book zurich 1953 to my readings and removed or replaced many as suggested. I'm unable to find older books in algebraic notation but it makes sense that they're better, I'll just get used to descriptive notations eventually. But for now I've enough material to get started :)
My tournament is in early January, not quite 2 months but I'll post how I do :D
Thanks again
Hello everyone it's my first post here, and so far I've read lots of helpful replies on other threads so I'm hoping to get one too :D
I'm a ~1700 player OTB, and until now I've not studied chess and had been stunt by 5min blitz games on chesscube.com
My tactical abilities are good therefore, but when playing over the board at longer time controls I find myself wasting a lot of time trying to find a plan or even a reasonable objective. My understanding of the game is weak, and my endgame is.. well, how often do you come across those in blitz.
I joined the chess club at school and want to sincerely improve for tournaments. More than ratings and results I want to learn chess, and enjoy its elegance and fireworks like Tal or Kasparov.
I'm planning to spend 2-3 hours a day, but I don't know on what. There are so many books and videos available online it's hard to know where to begin.
Given my playing strength, resources and objective, what do you suggest I do? I've made a list of books that were recommended by lots of people, but I don't know which ones to read and in what order:
A long list I know but it reflects how seriously I'm taking this :D
What do you suggest? Which ones and in what order should I read them? Or are there other books or methods you recommend instead?
I appreciate anyone who took the time to read this and wants to help. However given how convoluted things already are, I'd appreciate if you comment only knowing your advice is helpful than just an opinion as I'm already very confused. Hope you don't take it the wrong way, I already appreciate your read very much.
Thanks a lot in advance :)