I used to have the second edition and plan on getting another copy eventually. It is just about the most complete manual I have personally seen for studying chess including openings with game examples, classical middle game positions, basic endgames and how to play them and covers just about every aspect of the game. It has a very nice glossary in the back with definitions of chess terms along with famous games and covers computer chess also. It even has exercises to figure out. I highly recommend it. If it came in a hardcover copy I would swipe it up in a heartbeat.
If you go to the following link on Amazon, you can click on "Read Sample" and look and the Table of Contents and see many pages within the book.
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