Chess books?

[faith]

Reading available literature and studying poker has changed the way I approach and play other games- I figure chess study can only help my poker game

I've played chess since childhood, and have noticed that my level of chess play (as well as backgammon and other games) has improved due to poker study. Now I'd like to really learn to play chess. There seems to be so much literature out there; I don't know where to begin. Any suggestions?

Just remembering a night when I met my first "educated" card player. About 5 yrs ago a guy told me if I want to really learn the game remember 2 names... I was more than a bit drunk in that morning conversation, but in the bookstore the next afternoon, as I looked for "stunt skiing mammoth" I came across TOP and HPFAP... and it's all downhill from there...

Is there an equivilent to TOP in chess (TOC perhaps?) that covers broad strategy/ tactictal approaches in different stages of the game...

or an equivilant to HPFAP... something heavy with alot to study when progressing through different levels of understanding the game... or is there mabye 3 seperate "HPFAP"'s for the early, mid and late stages of play...

recommended approaches to study chess?

Thanks in advance,
faith

[vic1225]

Playing chess can improve all decisions or analysis we come across. I play just enough to bite the poker bug. The TOP of chess would be Jeremy Silman's How to reassess your chess, as a matter of fact, he is probably the 2+2 equivalent to chess. Books by Yasser Seirawan, The Polgar sisters, and Bruce Pandolfini are great.

[Leavenfish]

Faith,
I've played tournament chess for 25 years and I've taught a few people along the way. I've probably close to 400 chess books. I'm rated 2400 ICCF and my last correpondence tourney was in the Semi-finals of the 26th World Championship. I just finished at slightly over 50% but it was a good run against some awesome competition.
Honestly, to give a good answer I would really need to know exactly where you are as a chess player. Do you have a couple of recent representative games you could send me?
What you need really does depend on where you are at in your development as a player. I disagree with Vic about Pandolfini (unless you are a rank beginner). Silmans book is good to help work some bad thinking out of your play. Dvoretsky has a number of excellent books...but they are not for your average player.

Thanks,
Leavenfish

[MegumiAmano]

[ QUOTE ]
Jeremy Silman's How to reassess your chess, as a matter of fact, he is probably the 2+2 equivalent to chess.

[/ QUOTE ]

I was going to suggest the same book and also "The Amateur's Mind" by the same author. These books made me really think about the game in a way that I never had before and were interesting enough that I actually wanted to study what I was reading.

The Amateur's Mind is a series of lessons that he built from teaching people live. They make mistakes, and he turns it into an exercise on how they screwed up.

[Shandrax]

[ QUOTE ]
Reading available literature and studying poker has changed the way I approach and play other games- I figure chess study can only help my poker game

I've played chess since childhood, and have noticed that my level of chess play (as well as backgammon and other games) has improved due to poker study. Now I'd like to really learn to play chess. There seems to be so much literature out there; I don't know where to begin. Any suggestions?

Just remembering a night when I met my first "educated" card player. About 5 yrs ago a guy told me if I want to really learn the game remember 2 names... I was more than a bit drunk in that morning conversation, but in the bookstore the next afternoon, as I looked for "stunt skiing mammoth" I came across TOP and HPFAP... and it's all downhill from there...

Is there an equivilent to TOP in chess (TOC perhaps?) that covers broad strategy/ tactictal approaches in different stages of the game...

or an equivilant to HPFAP... something heavy with alot to study when progressing through different levels of understanding the game... or is there mabye 3 seperate "HPFAP"'s for the early, mid and late stages of play...

recommended approaches to study chess?

Thanks in advance,
faith

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, I have written many reviews on chess books and I also have quite a collection myself, so I hope this comment will be helpful to you.

For beginners or those who have never been to a chess club I would recommend: Capablanca "Chess Fundamentals".

For more advanced players I think Silman's "Reassess your Chess" isn't that bad because he tries to improve your thinking process and that is surpisingly rare in chess literature.

I would also like to recommend: Stean "Simple Chess" and Nimzowitsch "My System".

If you move up approaching master level then you can consider the Dvoretsky-Series of course, but this is something for players with Elo 2200+ and if you were able to handle these already, then you definitely wouldn't need any suggestions from us anymore. The same goes for Dorfman "The Method in Chess".

Chess is a game of complete information. Some players believed that if they would simply play the best move possible, it would not matter who their opponent was. Other players tried to apply psychology to chess and were very successful with it. I think these players are very interesting from the standpoint of Poker. So if you want to find out more about that, check out the games of Lasker and Kortchnoi.

[Punker]

I also liked Amateurs Mind. Didn't care for Reassess your chess (I might be the only player I ever met who would say that however).

[OrianasDaad]

Here's a rough list of equivalent books, in my opinion:

HPFAP: My System, Nimzovitch
SSHE: Reassess Your Chess, Silman
TOP: Think Like a Grandmaster, Kotov
GSIH: Winning Chess series, Seirawan & Silman

Lots of other good books, especially focusing on different phases of the game:

Opening: MCO, Ideas Behind the Openings (Fine).
Middlegame: 5334 Problems... (Laszlo Polgar), Art of Attack in Chess (Vukovic).
Endgame: Basic Chess Endings (Fine), Guide to Chess Endings (Euwe).
Games Collections: My 60 Memorable Games (Fischer), The Most Instructive Games of Chess Ever Played (Chernev).

I've been away from chess for a couple of years, so I'm unsure about some of the newer publications. Kasparov was writing a series of books focusing on each previous world champion, which I'm sure will be top quality. His book on Karpov is bound to be full of insight for a more advanced chess player.

I've heard that there have been more books printed on chess than any other individual subject, but this is probably due to the number of books printed on the different opening variations. Go with the recommendations of the great players, and you probably won't go too wrong.

[faith]

Where I am as a chess player... My uneducated attempt at a description would be:

a bit better than most casual players that have never been to a chess club. my attack is generally uncoordinated and I find myself reacting instead of controling the board. I find myself in the scenerio similar to that of new holdem players when raising any two face cards UTG. No position, no control, and it's tough to know where you're at through the rest of the hand-. So I kind of shuffle the pieces around with short term tactics in mind (thinking of just a few pieces at a time with different groups of pieces working on different little plans) and don't see the broader picture of how all the pieces are affecting one another. As the board becomes less cluttered, so does my thinking... against most casual players, I can make up any lost ground... but against people that can play, I can't regain control so they just need to grind me down, create an opening, and that's "checkmate".

I'm off to pick up Simlans book. Amature Mind will be in the cart as well if it's there... Well in all honesty, I'll probably have to wait a week before reading a word as English book selection tend to be a bit limited in Bangkok. There is more than a shelf of chess books in 1 bookstore so my chances are decent. Fedex is killing my wallet.

I did have 1 magic game about 8 years ago where it seemed like my entire board was coordinated and my pieces seemed to own all 64 squares. My opponent (in an airport USO) and his friend both started talking about ratings and other things I had no clue about (except from the "Searching for Bobby Fisher" movie). Well we played again and my true colors came through.