I just picked up "How to Play Against 1.e4" by Neil McDonald which is a repertoire book for black advocating the french defence. I've been playing the french forever and I picked this up because I wanted to learn more about the MacCutcheon variation of the french and this has a nice chapter concerning that variation. I really wasn't expecting anything else but to my surprise McDonald makes a good case for several other variations which I may just incorporate into my own repertoire. 

Anyway, if anyone is interested in picking up the french for black I recommend giving this book a try.

Interesting! Which is your pet line against the french??

Against the french? I never play against the french as I never play 1.e4

Eric, which variation does Neil recommend against the old main line of the Mac Cutch (6.Bd2 Bxc3 7.bxc3 Ne4 8.Qg4 g6 9.Bd3 Nxd2 10.Kxd2 c5 11.Nf3 - or 11.Qf4)

He advocates 8...Kf8 instead of the usual g6 

However, against 8...Kf8 9.Bd3 Nxd2 10.Kxd2 c5 11.Nf3 he likes 11...c4 12.Be2 b5 

Maccutcheon is currently doing fine, right?

Yea, the toughest line for black right now seems to be the Be3 gambit.

I've bought this book a week ago and indeed it's a very good book. McDonald definitely has a gift for expaining things in a pretty clear manner.

For now I'm just cutting some corners in learning the French so I will be playing his recommended....... Fort Knox!

I just picked up this book recently, and I'm enjoying it.

I've already tried the Fort Knox variation once and won with it. Oddly, we were in book for 12 moves, then my opponent hung a piece on the 13th move and resigned immediately when I took it. D'oh!!! I was just shocked that we were in book for that long, since I was improvising a bit, and we got there via a different move order than the example in the book.

I like his suggestion against the Advance variation of playing the usual c5 and Qb6, then trading your bad bishop for white's good bishop with Bd7 and Bb5, instead of just playing the typical Nc6 to attack d4 again. I also recently picked up the first of Susan Polgar's 3 DVD series on the French, and she recommends the same thing against the French Advance, though she recommends Bd7 before Qb6. Anyone know any reason to care about the exact move order at that point? I definitely want to try this variation a few times and see how it goes.

I may also try McDonald's weirder recommendation of 3. ... b6 against the Advance at some point, especially against one guy at the local club who spends way too much time on opening study and always plays the Advance against the French as white. Getting him out of his perparation is always fun. :P

--Fromper