The Self-Taught Road to Sucking Less By Playing Through a Bajillion Books By Yourself?

Hey Team!

My name's Shoe, I'm a teacher, a (very much terrible) novice chess player, and I'd like to improve. So, I did what a teacher might do: I did some research and created a chess course for individual study. The idea was to make a class that I could "take" myself, so to speak.

I've included the syllabus and reading schedule below.

Before I undertake this self-made class, I'd really love to hear any and all feedback on the content, reading schedule, etc. In particular:

--Are there any exercises or online resources missing? (I'm very unfamiliar with all Chess.com and Lichess have to offer). If so, where do you think it should go?

--Is this reading schedule realistically attainable? Are any books missing?

--At what point should one start playing games, and if so, which format? (For instance, it seems odd to me to jump into complete games having only tried learning some opening stuff and not having learned any endgame stuff)

Thank you for much for reading, for any and all feedback, and I hope to hear back soon!

Oh God ... I'm never getting a course lol too much stuff

But tbh they can help but just like in books some of them are good and some of them are really horrible so try to pick wisely (not that I need to tell a teacher that lol )

Even though studying can help the best thing you can do is play out games yourself (preferably learning while doing it and playing out positions even if your losing don't resign )

I personally think endgames and midgames are more important cause you can just play system openings up until 2200+ then you kinda have to know what your doing in the opening

It feels like everyone study's at 1200-1600 though even tho I never have

Thought try to do what you feel like you need to work on try to figure out what type of mistake you are making and how /why /,how to fix them

If you need examples ,long diagonal blind spots (bishopes taking queens ,ect) tunnel visioning on a few squares ,being too trade happy ,not being aggressive enough ,being too defensive ,not being able to defend down a piece ,bad strategy ,bad tactic ,etc those are just a few btw

Theres alot lol you cant explain everything I one book(or comment ) though you can always try

Hi! I currently have around a little over 30 chess books. That's more than what most people have these days. I didn't use online sites like chessable to improve.

I'll get straight to the point. You're getting too many books. Let me explain why. It's a lot of words but since you're a teacher I'm sure you'd be okay.

I divide chess books into a few categories:

- Opening books

- Endgame books

- Principles books

- Fun books

Opening books are books about openings, and endgame books involve the endgame. They could be manuals, like dvoretsky or beginner-friendly, like Silman's endgames. Most of your book collection is probably going to come in the form of opening books, if you enjoy openings (which I did - perhaps 10-15 of all my books are opening-related).

Principles books are books that are clearly meant to be educational, but don't provide a clear area of focus, and may instead focus on a certain rating range (How to become a candidate master), be a collection of educational games (Logical chess, move by move), or a few specific chess patterns (Chess structures - a grandmaster guide). Middlegame books do not exist since it is the most complex part of the game, and too many middlegames exist. These types of books should be seen as a way to improve your middlegame.

Fun books: books about chess, and you may learn things, but would not recommend for learning. They may be a collection of games, which you can learn from, but aren't specifically written with learning in mind, but rather to show some interesting games. For example: Bobby Fischer and his world by John Donaldson (it's a great book! but not for educational purposes.)

I would like to add that out of my 30+ books I have only read a few of them from cover to cover. Those being an alekhine's defense book, Chess structures, logical chess, How to become a Candidate master, and my two books on the bird's opening. For most opening books, you will read important variations first and you won't need to dive into deeper variations. With this being said, there's another reason why you don't need that many books.

They are redundant. I have traps and zaps. It's closer to a tactics book, where you get a bunch of puzzles and then you do them. It's not a bad book, but I don't think anyone needs that type of book anymore. I worked through about half of it before I realized I was just better off working on puzzles online (more on that later).

The rest of your opening books are very similar; they are all general opening books (meaning they cover opening concepts and not any specific opening). And since opening principles have been pretty set in stone for the last hundred years, you'll find out you're getting diminishing returns from reading that many. And it's not like people process information as soon as they read them, and if you can't implement what you learn in game then have you really learned anything? I would cut down on the beginner books to one, maybe two at most for each topic.

And tactics. I don't think anyone needs tactics books in this day and age, you can do as many tactics as you want on lichess, or on chess.com if you pay like 25 US dollars a year. I see you have the diamond flair. You should use it! Do the tactics here. The only thing a tactics book can offer you that online puzzles can't is an explanation of why the tactic works, and how to solve them in the first place.

But tactics (puzzles) are just very simple. They are a series of forced moves that give you an advantage, or in rare cases, keep the game even in face of seemingly overwhelming odds (but those tend to be very advanced ones so we won't worry about those). If you get a tactic wrong, you don't "need" two paragraphs explaining of why this move is forced;

Just remember this importance ladder: mating > losing pieces > other. Usually losing pieces is bad, so an opponent will try to not lose their pieces. But if the computer says taking a free piece is wrong, there's always two reasons: you missed a better move (bigger piece or mate threat), or you lose material after this move. And to find out the mistake in your calculations all you need to do is press the big fat magnifying glass at the bottom right of your screen and you will see engine recommended moves, and they will tell you how the opponent can punish your bad move.

Of course the engine doesn't tell you "why" you missed his bishop from across the board (for example), but the book won't tell you either, and at least with online puzzles you'll never run out of them, and you're also already paying for them, so why not use them for now?

I am getting a bit tired so I'll end this soon. But basically your list of books have a whole bunch of redundant stuff in them, and unless you're reading for fun and not strictly improvement I wouldn't recommend getting all that. Like, Right under logical chess you have another logical thinking chess book... Seriously! People don't go through chess books like regular books, trust me... I read in the bathroom!

Anyways. If I had to say just one thing to you, it wouldn't be to cut down on the books, but rather after reading a concept, you should stop, and try to replicate it in a game. Could be a game against yourself. Or a game against someone online. Doesn't need to be a 30 minute game or whatever people are saying. Just try to get games in, try to focus on making that concept or opening repeatedly show itself, and repeatedly nail it. If it's an opening, try to play the opening. What goes wrong? what did you like or dislike? If it's a concept, like the tactic forks. Try to look for them in your games. Maybe you'll see a fork of two pawns. Sadly, they are defended. Maybe next time! But you're out here looking for them, building that habit and it'll become an unconscious skill.

Sorry if that sounds like rambling. Tried to format it better but the amazing website doesn't recognize extra enter keys or spaces, apparently.

I would like to add something sacrificing for a winning attack can be helpful in some positions ,lol chess books can be helpful but it is true mpst of the basics can be taught online I actually have zero opening books in total

I would like to recommend try to review your game before using stockfish first try to see if you can figure out your mistakes even if you fail to spot it during the review I dislike stockfish at low depth it typically misses small moves,or sometimes even obvious sacrifices and can dock it as a bad move

You can use and listen to stockfish but don't just blindly trust it it is helpful sometimes

Yes but if he reads logical chess by chernev he'll see plenty of examples of this, so it's redundant. Plus I wouldn't exactly encourage beginners to throw away material (because if youre sacrificing without actually being able to calculate, you're just cosplaying as santa in chess)

I disagree. For maybe intermediate players like, 1300 or something yes, but not for beginners. Reviewing your own games is helpful, but only if you have clear knowledge to base it on. Someone new to chess won't have any way to base their analysis on, or even know where to analyze. It's simply more efficient and easier to run the engine, see that it says "this move is bad" and then try to figure out why it's bad (as in, verbalize it). And of course if you can't you can always just ask people online in forums, reddit, discord ...

"just try to get games in, try to focus on making that concept or opening repeatedly show itself, and repeatedly nail it. If it's an opening, try to play the opening. What goes wrong? what did you like or dislike? If it's a concept, like the tactic forks. Try to look for them in your games. Maybe you'll see a fork of two pawns. Sadly, they are defended. Maybe next time! But you're out here looking for them, building that habit and it'll become an unconscious skill."

basicaly what they are saying is trying to replicate them in your games. That is the important try to fix your mistakes or notice them during game, and try to get into good habits while doing so. Not just by reading books or studying isn't always getting better at chess. It isn't always studying, but it can't help. I really don't recommend getting too hung up on studying as sometimes it stunts some people improvement when doing it wrong (it does help others tho ) .

In my opinion importance is checkmate>king safety ,an open king can be safe even if it doesn't look like that ,>space while not over extending >positional squares >piece material ,I actually disabled that on lichsss lol so I would try to find good moves instead of just being picky about material ,>other though feel free to correct me ! 

man please use some punctuation, use a comma or something, those paragraphs are very hard to read.

Long quash this isn't the place for massive amounts of criticism ...really most people cant take you seriously either lol

Sorry lol fast typer...give me 5-10 min to fix it

You can always make a more detailed list, but I just wanted to give a simplified version. I wouldn't expect a new player to know what overextending is, or positional squares is. The point was to show that there exists a hierarchy of importance, where the threat of one thing outweighs the second, thus forcing someone to defend the first, allowing you to gain an advantage with the second threat.

For example, you make a queen move, threatening mate in one, but also attacking their rook. They would like to defend it, but if they do, they get mated. So you win the rook.

For beginners yes analyzing stockfish might be more helpful but at a certain point it isn't as bad lol it's usually just a lot of beginners just get stuck by doing it incorrectly

Thought they should still get into the practice of reviewing first not always verbalizing it (then fixing it in stockfish ) later down the line at least when they start to become an intermediate

I think this would be way easier to explain in person lol so much stuff to talk about online chess is alot

I don't follow you around anywhere ? Lol this is my first comment to you in like a week almost I talk a lot yes but not usually to you

it is a lot easier lmfao

Hi @Shoebaccha. Some great advice given to you in this thread already.

I second the feedback about there being too many books on this list. Far too many. You don't want to burn yourself out on chess learning - especially since you expressed hesitation about playing.

You should try to find a comfortable balance between playing and learning. Yes, you're going to be playing games and not knowing what to do - that's part of the learning process.

We all stumble and fall when first learning to walk. Expect to stumble and fall, over and over, and over again. That's necessary.

You have to play a lot of terrible chess in order to one day play great chess.

Regarding books, @cR1NN already gave you some stellar advice. So I'll just offer my own: choose one book for each category of learning.

For example:

1 game collection book

1 opening book

1 tactics book

1 endgame book

There - that's four books. That's your reading list for the semester. Make your way through all four of those and you've completed more chess education than the majority of chess players out there.

In meantime, do as @EwingKlipspringer suggested and give yourself permission to play some games.

As a beginner, I recommend going gentle on yourself with: 2 games a day. One game with the White pieces, and one game with the Black pieces.

You can adjust this number as you see fit, based on whether or not it feels like too much or not enough. But yes, it is important that you play, too - and not just study.

Playing (and reflecting on the mistakes you made) is also a crucial part of the learning curve. Make mistakes. Blunder. Get crushed and checkmated, repeatedly. Try, all the while, to do a little better than the previous game - and keep learning from the books you're reading in the meanwhile.

This is how you'll grow, as a player, from a lamb to a lion.

The problem is cause I didn't do the traditional way of how to learn chess my advice is a bit iffy sometimes though when I explain it in person usually people perform a lot better honestly the best thing you can do as a beginner is (typically )

Just try not to be too harsh on yourself ,focus on your blind spots ,learn from your blunders (wins and losses ) play a few games a day as that's usually how you get better at chess ,and just try to improve a little each time you play like if you blunder an early checkmate attack learn how to defend against it ,you mess up in queen endgame and stalemate learn how not to stalemate ,etc

Honestly I would recommend reading through this forum it gives pretty good advice on mentality/where to start and closer to what I have been trying to explain

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/for-beginners/16-tips-from-a-2300-rated-player

Hi