My first and only chess book is The Most Instructive Games of Chess Ever Played by Irving Chernev. My elder brother gave it to me when i was 10 or 11 years old as a birthday gift. This book provided me insights on how the game is played with the likes of Capa, Fischer, Tal, Lasket, Alekhine in there and all the other greatest chess players of the past. i haven't opened it for a long time. Recently, when I joined chess.com, I remembered my book, I looked for it thinking I already lost it but no, I found it, waiting for me to open it again and enjoy, once again, the greatest games of chess ever played. Now I'm giving it to may 4 year-old son whom i trying to teach how to play the game, as a gift. Old books are like old friends. You may forget them in certain period of your life, but they're not lost, there are always there, waiting for you.
Favorite Chess book And Why
You know, Irving Chernev is the most instructive chess author to my knowledge, i wish there were more like him, who could break things down Barney Style
1) Logical Chess Move by Move - Irving Chernev
The absolute classic! I read this whilst on holiday on Thassos a couple of years ago. It covers everything in a way which inspires you to just get out there and play chess. Chernev's style of writing is infectious. My only criticism is that it rather favours the QG lines which take up 11 out of 33 games. There are also 4 games from the Colle system!? Even though it isn't all about openings, a little more variety would have given the book even more interest.
2) Back to Basics: Tactics - Dan Heisman
Not everyone's 2nd best ever book. That's only because not many people have it!
Heisman, like Chernev, has a way of making learning chess fun. This book takes the dry topic of tactics & turns it on it's head.
Heisman starts off with the absolute most basic tactic; ie "counting" (which simply means whether a piece is safe or not on it's square after possible series of exchanges) and expands to cover all the motifs in a perfect learning curve.
I especially like the little blue boxes of text on each page which have nuggets of wisdom put across in Heisman's user-friendly style.
Forget Winning Chess Tactics; this is required reading for anyone 0-1800.
3) The Mammoth Book Of Chess - Graham Burgess
Ok, I can forgive you if you think I've lost the plot. 3rd favourite chess book?
Yep. And here's why...
Burgess covers absolutely everything in this; Notation, Rules, Tactics, Strategy, The Chess World... This is all done very well, but for me the key ingredient here is a huge section (p 109-277) on the openings.
When I wanted to form a repertoire, it was this book which gave me the ideas of what openings I wanted to try. It's absolutely stuffed full of ideas.
For most of the major openings Burgess gives both strategic examples and trap lines with plenty of analysis.
The following section entitled Attack and Defence is a superb theme-based series of annotated games. His skills as a writer are often praised, and quite rightly so.
Inspired!
4) A First Book Of Morphy - Frisco Del Rosario
Who? What? Huh?
This, for those who don't know, is basically the version of Logical Chess Move By Move for those of us who have a rather more attacking style than wishing to sit tight & play the Colle system!
In here you'll find 60 games, pretty thoroughly annotated, which demonstrate Fine's principles from his classic Chess The Easy Way.
The book is divided into 3 sections; Opening/Middlegame/Endgame and there are 10 general principles for each with games to illustrate them.
In this book you'll find 16 King's Gambits, 14 Evans Gambits and 6 Two-Knight's Defence games, amongst many others.
5) The Modern Morra Gambit - Hannes Langrock
This is here purely because of the effort involved in bringing an opening which is largely ignored by serious players up to spec.
You think the Morra is unsound? Fine. Now read Langrock's take on your pick of the best defences.
By careful database evaluation (and no doubt help from Mr. Fritz) Langrock distils solid winning chances for White in almost every line. What I like is that he remains objective though. He clearly states that some lines are equal or give Black an advantage.
Whilst it's unashamedly a White repertoire book, the effort involved in sourcing the material, the original analysis (some does come from earlier books form Palkovi and Burgess) and the enthusiasm which he brings to the work makes this my favourite openings guide.
I agree with you guys about Irving Chernev; I bought The Most Instructive Games of Chess Ever Played a few months ago, and it's terrific - very readable and clear. But No.1 spot for me is my battered old copy of Bobby Fischer's My 60 Memorable Games. My girlfriend bought it for me in 1972 and what little I understand about chess I've learned from this book. The annotations are very focused and enthusiastic, the games themselves are amazing. Was Fischer the first to put some losses in a collection like this one (there are three, to Spassky, Tal and Geller)?
The book has lasted a lot longer than the relationship did, but thanks Elaine, you did me a favour.
My most instructive would have to come down to forcing chess moves or watson's mastering the chess openings series and then maybe khalifmans openings for white according to anand a notch below.
HOLY MACARONI, I have to go on amazon and find A First Book Of Morphy - Frisco Del Rosario. That is MANDATORY!!! I love attacking chess, and i want a new book to read when i get home. And i must say Fischer's 60 most memorable games is awesome. I do believe he is one of the few who put losses in his books. BUT as we all know we remember some of our losses pretty well....
My personal favorite is My System- Nimzovich because it helped me more than any other book.
These are all very good books, I own My System, but i havent ever had the time to sit down with some coffee and actually read the book. I am looking forward to it though!
The book that brought me back to chess and that I still recommend to every beginner or casual player thinking about getting their first chess book I meet is Raymond Keene & Michael Gelb's Samurai Chess. It is absolutely mandatory reading for anybody who practices martial arts as well as chess, demonstrating perfectly how the two are inseparable, and to my knowledge it is the only book to do this and to proscribe a physical as well as a mental training program for the chess player wanting to improve.
Other favorites are Josh Waitzkin's The Art of Learning (not strictly a chess book, but 100% applicable for chess players), and Edward Lasker's Modern Chess Strategy and Chess For Fun & Chess For Blood.
I loved Kotov's Think Like a Grandmaster and still go through it. Of course I grew up on Fischer's 60 Memorable Games and Bronstein's Zurich 1953. These still remain among my favorites. All three really teach you how ti think and look at chess games. There are flaws in all of them but that helps make them human not just computer generated.
Frisco's book on Morphy is quite good. I always laugh when I remember our days together at the Berkley CC
Mine would definitly be "Silmans endgame course" It's starts out very elementary but this book has a lot to offer for any one under 2200. It breaks down endgame lessons to what he thinks say a class e to expert player should know (I think he hit it on the head). I am a big Silman fan and I especially like the way he explains the material. I seem to understand his points better than most other chess books I have read. At the end of the book he picks 5 grandmasters to show some of their end games. Check it out and please write me your opinion on this book.
Ok, the subject breaks it down Barney-Style. I know for me I have 2 favorites. Logical Chess Move by Move- By: Irving Chernev, Then my second favorite is The Art of The Checkmate- By:Georges Renaud, Victor Kahn. These 2 books helped me improve more than anything else. If i had a copy of the book, i would read it again. Because when you go through it, you will relearn it. There is always a time when the Logical isnt the best move, BUT for beginners and someone who has played a while but hasnt broken the rating of 1600 i recommend this book! Art of the Checkmate, teaches you patterns for checkmates, sometimes you have to see something and know why you do it before you can actual see it. I know if someone would have thrown me in the pool to learn, i would learn.... but not before i almost drowned and lost sight of how fun it is.