For tactics
•Woodpecker method. - Recommended for every intermediate-advanced player
Strategy and middlegames
•How to reassess your chess (4th edition recommended)
Theoretical endgames
•100 endgames you must know by jeus de la vida
•Jeremy silman's complete endgame course
I recently wrote a blog post with a summary for people who asked me. I talked to different people and, based on my own experience, I wrote down the ones I found most useful. I'm not saying they're the best. I'm leaving the blog post in case anyone wants to see the list.
Are there any free ones in PDF form I can read online or is that considered piracy xD
@Yamagumo Of all the books I listed on my blog, the only one I know of that is free is "Think Like a Grandmaster – Alexander Kotov" although if you search there are excerpts from many free books.
Thanks for all the suggestions so far.
I enjoy learning through books. But when it comes to chess, I haven't read a single page yet :-).
Happy to see this forum!
What do you think is the most optimal way of studying an opening book? Go through all the lines one by one? Go trough the major ones first? Something else? Assuming I want to create a strong repertoire on the opening and not just familiarize myself with the ideas.
Has anyone read Dynamic Chess Strategy by Mihai Suba? If you have can you tell me your experience with it? I picked it up and I'm right around that 1900-2000 FIDE range it's written for but his writing is a little intense which usually I'm fine with being an avid reader but the first chapter was awful to me.
I haven't read Dynamic Chess Strategy, but I did read another book by Mihai Suba, The Hedgehog, and I can say that his style is quite distinctive. He tends to write in a very personal way, as if he's telling you stories from his own head, rather than structuring an orderly chess course. Sometimes this makes him interesting, but it can also be confusing or even frustrating if you expect a clear explanation.
Suba writes more as a narrator of his experiences than as a step-by-step instructor. He mixes anecdotes, strategic ideas, and personal observations without much filtration. But if you keep reading, you'll start to grasp his approach, and at least in my opinion, it's incredible.
An excellent middlegame book is Simple Chess by Michael Stean: https://www.amazon.com/Simple-Chess-New-Algebraic-Dover/dp/0486424200
I hear a lot of nice things about that book. How advanced is it?
I would say 100 endings u must know
I haven't read Dynamic Chess Strategy, but I did read another book by Mihai Suba, The Hedgehog, and I can say that his style is quite distinctive. He tends to write in a very personal way, as if he's telling you stories from his own head, rather than structuring an orderly chess course. Sometimes this makes him interesting, but it can also be confusing or even frustrating if you expect a clear explanation.
Suba writes more as a narrator of his experiences than as a step-by-step instructor. He mixes anecdotes, strategic ideas, and personal observations without much filtration. But if you keep reading, you'll start to grasp his approach, and at least in my opinion, it's incredible.
Excellent. That's what I've grasped from others is that if you can push through his stream of thought writing you will learn a lot. And I hear that from players who are stronger than me and are where I want them to be, so I'll stick with it. Thank you
Im reading Positional Decision making, and working on Perfect Your Chess
Happy to see this forum!
What do you think is the most optimal way of studying an opening book? Go through all the lines one by one? Go trough the major ones first? Something else? Assuming I want to create a strong repertoire on the opening and not just familiarize myself with the ideas.
I don't really think there is a best way to study from books; it depends on what your personal style of learning is, what the content of the book is, how much time you are willing to dedicate, etc. For example, a book like Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual has many more concrete lines where you might need to play out every variation to fully understand the ideas, whereas some opening books might look more at the general principles of the position and give various plans depending on what your opponent does.
a few tips that help me study from books: firstly, always play things out on a board, idealy it would be on an actual board, but sometimes it can be a lot easier to do online, and for that I would recommend chessvisionAI, which can scan the positions and put them onto Lichess (it will also pull the position from the masters database so you can see the whole game aswell)
Secondly, be curious about the position, this doesn't just mean play out all of the lines in a book (which you should really be doing anyway) but play out the lines that aren't in the book aswell, not everything will be in the book so if you have any questions about why a certain move wouldnt work try play it out against the computer and see what happens
Finally, you don't have to read a book in order, if there is a specific thing you are struggling with, then try going to that chapter and fix the problem first before wasting time on things you allready know, this will stop you loosing games in the meantime and will help keep you motivated because you are actually learning new things.
Guys Woodpecker is a good book the ansers are at the back of the pdf
Hi, for more advanced players (2000+ on chess.com or 1750+ FIDE) I would heavily recommend the "Tiger jump" series by Artur Jussupow. The well-structured information really benefited me a lot. There are 3 different series (Tiger jump to 1. 1500 2. 1800 3. 2100 (FIDE Elo)). Even if you are already at a higher rating, it makes a lot of sense to start with the 1500 series to fill out possible holes in your chess knowledge. It is 3 books per series, each book being about 20$ a piece.
Best money I ever spend tbh - I have not even yet got a diamond membership, but this was defenitily worth it! Since I read the books in german, their original language, I am not 100% sure whether it has been translated in languages different from german and english. Anyway, try it out!
First, I'd recommend becoming bilingual in notation (i.e., learn descriptive) because there's a ton of wonderful, out-of-print chess books you can find at second-hand bookstores. Yes, it takes some getting used to, but 100% worth the effort.
For rank beginners:
Next level up
"Silman's Complete Endgame Course" is brilliant. Good for any level player, thorough but not confusing. Must read for anyone looking to improve their (end)game.
agree