I own one Schiller book:
http://www.amazon.com/Book-Busts-Competitive-Chess-Series/dp/1886040133
Schiller books?
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Nov 10, 2015
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#2
Nov 10, 2015
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#3
I have a book by Schiller. Although he writes well, the book was from his own company (I think) and the diagrams were hard to read, the text was small, and the book was much smaller than I thought it would be.
Shiller has written probably a hundred or more books. Many of his books have errors. He doesn't seem to use a "good" editor to check his books before publication.
Edward Winter (chess historian) does not speak well of Shiller or his books.
- "the underlying facts, i.e. the hundreds of gross errors that Schiller has perpetrated in the countless books that belch out under his name without a whiff of midnight oil or, even, a minimal degree of care." - Edward Winter
This is just one comment, there are many more negative comments. Do an Internet search if you want.
However Edward Winter is known as being a little anal retentive as you will learn if you read his colums in CHESS NOTES or his Wiki page.
http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Winter_(chess_historian)
They are regarded as careless, with bad analysis, if any. Quantity over quality. A lot of his books are supposedly database dumps.
Pfren wrote a good comment on chess.com:
"Schiller has written so many books (I own more than one dozen), at least one of them has to be good, or at least readable. Unfortunately I'm still searching in vain for it."
But if they are at the library, why not take one out which interests you, or at least have a scan read?
Nov 10, 2015
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#6
I haven't found the FM Schiller's books I've examine much better or much worse than most chess writers. It must be difficult living under the judgment of - and being a target of - one vigilante critic.
In my public library chess section about half the books are by Schiller. Why?
Everyman used to be Cadogan. Cardoza is a different company.
I have a handful of Schiller books. Complete Defense to Queen Pawn Openings is a pretty decent intro to the Tarrasch Defense. Other than that, I don't much like the Schiller books I have.
Nov 10, 2015
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#9
My teacher used to beat Schiller over the phone for money in high school, so when I got my first schiller book, it was little awkward. Poor schiller...
This Wikipedia write-up on Eric Shiller is interesting and tells you a lot about him.
I read that these books by Schiller are good:
639 Essential Endgames
The Big Book of Busts
Anyone can say something positive (I stress positive) about his other books?
Is anyone familiar with these books?
Improve Your Endgame
Strategy for Advanced Players
On the other hand, this book allegedly contains to much "borrowed" material:
Big Book of Combinations
My library has quite a few books by Eric Schiller, published by Cardoza Publishing.
I never see his name mentioned when chess books are recommended, and I was wondering why not. I think I read some derogatory comments about him in a post here once, but I am not sure.
Is he not well regarded?