Best Chess Books???

Now I know there is a vast amount of literature available. In your humble opinions, what have been the most helpful, insightful, or enlightening chess reads?

Logical Chess by Irving Chernev

The Amateur's Mind by Jeremy Silman

Paul Morphy: A Modern Perspective by Valerie Beim

Fundamental Chess Endings by Mueller/Lamprecht

Endgame Virtuoso Anatoly Karpov by Karolyi

A Practical Guide to Rook Endings by Minev

Ok three seems to be the magic number. As I am only a beginner, I have been helped by

 The ideas behind the chess openings by  Reuben Fine

The mammoth book of chess by Graham Burgess

How good is your chess by Leonard Barden.

Of course, any good collection of games w/annotations is always nice. 

In my opinion if you're not completely new to chess, meaning you know some openings, basic endgames, and know some common tactical errors then, my suggestions would be

1. Zurich International Chess Tournament 1953 by Bronstein
2.  Pawn Structure Chess by Soltis
   
3. Combinations by Chernev, and Modern Chess Strategy by Pachman.

I used mostly these books and went from about 1000 USCF to about 1900.  There is a lot to disgest in these books so you won't see anything improving for a while (took me a year to see visible improvement)  but after that year, I went from like 1150 to 1270 to 1390 in my next two tournaments beating like 3 1500's and 2 1700's and and a 1900.  I was quite suprised because I hadn't took a look at those books for a while.  To be honest, I hadn't looked at any chess over my summer vacation and so when the school year came back in, all of a sudden I just understood what was going on much better.  Again, if you are looking for some serious improvement and don't mind waiting to see the results, you would love those books. 

correction*  there are four books its just that list thing didn't like me, so under 3. there are two books. 

Listings of favorite books and none mention My System by Nimzovich?!  Whats the world coming to?

how about chess opennings in theory and practice?

Pawn Structure by Soltis? I heard that was a good book! Anyone else have an opinion on it? And what is the salient feature of "My System"?

You must get "My System"

Some of my favorites :  My System-Nimzovich  , Art of Attack-Vukovic , 1953 Zurich - Bronstein,  Middlegame I & 2 -Euwe , Understanding the Chess Openings- R Fine - Practical Chess Endings- Keres   The Game of Chess- Tarrasch

The "Logical Chess : Move by move" featured on the homepage here I have seen before, it looks like it got a few good reviews. Maybe I'll read this book and then feel that I play chess logically. Well, I think the catch is that we all play chess "logically"...in a sense...but maybe not well. I've always got my reasons for moves I've made lol!

Funny no one had mentioned fischer's memorable games. There's kind of a funny feeling towards him sometimes...

The books can teach u a lot, but chess programs are much, much better. Chessmaster for PS2 is my favorite, I've gone through it two twice and realy looking forward for a new version. Try it if you realy want some help wih chess.

PS2 huh? I've got one of those around. On my computer right now I've got Chessmaster Challenge and the latest Fritz. There are some other random ebooks and training programs I've found online. I would post those things on here, but I don't know if theres copyright issues or something...

Just wanted to get this topic back up front, especially since there are some great suggestions on books.  :)

erad1288 wrote:

In my opinion if you're not completely new to chess, meaning you know some openings, basic endgames, and know some common tactical errors then, my suggestions would be

Zurich International Chess Tournament 1953 by Bronstein Pawn Structure Chess by Soltis
Combinations by Chernev, and Modern Chess Strategy by Pachman.

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 These books are fantastic.

I would like to add:

1. My System by Nimzowitsch

2. The Middlegame vol 1 2 by Euwe 

3. The Soviet Chess School by Kotov 

 

I love a lot of the books already mentioned, so I'll take a less technical turn.

Most fun: The Fireside Book of Chess

Best chess novel : The Defense by Vladimir Nabakov

Best chess novella: The Royal Game by Stefan Zweig

Best game anthology: The Golden Dozen

I picked up this one used book for a $1.50 - can't beat that. It's a lot of fun. It's called "How good is your chess?" by Leonard Barden. The setup of the book is 35 master level games, and at about 15 places in each game you are asked what move you would make. Then your choices are assessed. Pretty great. I think I'll get off chess.com right now and go read it.

How to Reassess Your Chess by Jeremy Silman