Chess opening books

Hi all, can anybody advise me on a good opening single volume book? I'm obviously not a pro but I would like it to be as comprehensive and analytical as possible

I just looked at a couple of your games. You don't need to study openings in depth at this point.

You need to learn the absolute basics. Your opening pawn play shows that you have not discovered this yet.

1. Put a Queen or King pawn in the center of the board, defend it and do everything you can to control the four squares in the center of the board.

2. Do not move any piece or pawn TWICE before you have castled. Sometimes this cannot be avoided, but you want to be aware of this rule.

3. Develop knights before bishops (Usually).

4. Castle.

Any chess book for beginners will cover these principles.

Go into your archive and look at the game you played against DutchGlory.

Look at the way you played and think about the principles I posted above. You will see the mistakes.

Thanx for your reply. I think the game you're talking about was a 1 minute game. I tend to panic in those ones and obviously play to win on time anyway. I usually play 1 day per move and give my moves some thought. I am familiar with the basic opening principles you mentioned even though at times I do experiment. Anyway , my question stands: I'm after a chess opening book. 

Paul van der Sterren's Fundamental Chess Openings seems to be the new gold standard.  Lots of explanations.  Obviously if you zero in on a few openings you'll need more specialized work but this and a database should do you for a bit.

Thanx a lot baddogno, I will look into it

You're very welcome.  Check out some of the other threads on the subject:

https://www.chess.com/forum/search?keyword=best+opening+book

If that's the case, then I would decide which opening you want to explore and buy a book that specializes in it.

It is a very appealing idea to somehow resolve one's opening difficulties with a single (large enough) opening book, but I am skeptical that it works out well for most. With regard to FCO specifically, first of all, I think it is worthwhile to note:

"... [Fundamental Chess Openings] is not particularly suited for players who are just starting out. I would imagine players rated at least 1400-1500 would get the most benefit from this volume. ..." - FM Carsten Hansen (2010)

https://web.archive.org/web/20140626173432/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen128.pdf

I believe that it is possible to see a sample from Fundamental Chess Openings by going to the Gambit Publications site.

http://www.gambitbooks.com/pdfs/FCO_Fundamental_Chess_Openings.pdf

There are smaller books with approximately the same sort of purpose, but I think they all pose serious problems if one is thinking in terms of reading from one end to the other. Perhaps, one has better chances of getting something useful from such a book if one's plan is to do some casual browsing, combined with more careful reading for selected openings, but, even then, I fear that the coverage for any one opening would not serve as much more than an introduction.

"... Half a dozen different openings, well learned, are about all the average player needs to obtain good results. ..." - from Capablanca's Primer of Chess

For someone seeking help with choosing openings, I usually bring up Openings for Amateurs by Pete Tamburro (2014).

http://kenilworthian.blogspot.com/2014/05/review-of-pete-tamburros-openings-for.html

I believe that it is possible to see a fair portion of the beginning of Tamburro's book by going to the Mongoose Press site.

https://www.mongoosepress.com/excerpts/OpeningsForAmateurs%20sample.pdf

Perhaps lorenzo_tamiazzo would also want to look at Discovering Chess Openings by GM John Emms (2006).

https://web.archive.org/web/20140627114655/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen91.pdf

"Each player should choose an opening that attracts him. Some players are looking for a gambit as White, others for Black gambits. Many players that are starting out (or have bad memories) want to avoid mainstream systems, others want dynamic openings, and others want calm positional pathways. It’s all about personal taste and personal need.

For example, if you feel you’re poor at tactics you can choose a quiet positional opening (trying to hide from your weakness and just play chess), or seek more dynamic openings that engender lots of tactics and sacrifices (this might lead to more losses but, over time, will improve your tactical skills and make you stronger)." - IM Jeremy Silman (January 28, 2016)

Also, perhaps look at:

https://www.chess.com/article/view/picking-the-correct-opening-repertoire

http://chess-teacher.com/best-chess-openings/

https://www.chess.com/blog/TigerLilov/build-your-opening-repertoire

https://www.chess.com/blog/CraiggoryC/how-to-build-an-opening-repertoire

You can get a lot of information online and even on Youtube. I wouldn't waste your time though espeically as a 1300 when you should be spending the majority of you chess time on improving your tactics and positional understanding.

I personally just bought a book on the portuguese gambit (of the Modern Scandinavian) and the Bird's opening.  I like these two because after 1. e4 d5 and 1. f4 the other player really doesn't have much choice but to play into these openings.

Get Fundamantal Chess Opening

https://www.amazon.com/FCO-Fundamental-Paul-Van-Sterren/dp/1906454132

"Chess Opening Essentials" is much more comprehensive than FCO.  It comes in 4 volumes and is written by grandmasters.

https://www.amazon.com/Chess-Opening-Essentials-Complete-Volumes/dp/9056913409/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1475804569&sr=8-3&keywords=essential+chess+openings

That's a great series!  I have it and it's general layout makes for an appealing read.  The diagrams are crisp and in color, the borders are nice and wide.  Alas, maybe 30% (40%, 50% ?) of the volumes are unannotated games they want you to work through.  Yes, it's wonderful to have a good selection of games illustrating each opening, but in this day of easy database access, it seems like padding.  As a result, FCO actually goes both deeper and wider on most openings despite being only one volume.

FCO

FYI...Its against site rules to advertise other chess sites.

But is that really "advertising"?

It's not like she is saying "Sign up for this chess site and get a free chess bag" or anything like that.

Saying "I play on Chess.com, ICC, and FreeChess.com" is a statement, Not an Advertisement!

Saying "I shop for books at USCFSales.com and Chess4Less.com" is again a statement, not an Advertisement!

Saying "ICC is giving free memberships to the 100th that signs up each calendar day" or "Chess4Less.com has a 95% off sale for all book published before 1950" or "Buy 1 year membership to all sections of ChessPublishing.com and get 6 months Free", would be "advertising" - And Note, NONE of this is true, it's ficticious and used strictly to differentiate "Advertising" versus stating the Existence of another site!

Understood, but it is still considered advertising another site.

Here are some reviews of the Essentials books:

https://web.archive.org/web/20140627115737/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen99.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20140627105306/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen124.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20140627070808/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen137.pdf

In case anyone only looks at the first review, I should perhaps mention that FM Carsten Hansen seemed to think that the series improved over time. A major objection throughout is to the inclusion of many games without annotation. I have mixed feelings about that. I feel that one generally needs some sample games to understand an opening, but it may not be much help to look at games with no commentary. Potential buyers should probably look at sample pages available at the New in Chess site.

https://www.newinchess.com/Shop/Images/Pdfs/380.pdf

https://www.newinchess.com/Shop/Images/Pdfs/926.pdf

https://www.newinchess.com/Shop/Images/Pdfs/927.pdf

https://www.newinchess.com/Shop/Images/Pdfs/940.pdf

In post #9, there are links to a review and a sample for FCO, which is, by the way, also by a grandmaster (Paul van der Sterren). The New in Chess site has a sample for My First Chess Opening Repertoire for White.

https://www.newinchess.com/Shop/Images/Pdfs/9033.pdf

A very good GM.  Finished tied for second (74 participants) at the 1993 Interzonal tournament, ahead of Anand, Ivanchuk, Topalov, Shirov etc.