Best Books on Ruy Lopez and QGD?

Hi all,

If I could choose only one or two books to delve into the Ruy Lopez and the Queen's Gambit Declined openings from White's perspective, what would those be?

Grateful for advice.

Andrew Greet's Play the Ruy Lopez.

For the QGD, you need specialist stuff on the Tarrasch, Bf4 systems, etc.

Nothing personal, but I don't think you  need specialized opening books yet (strictly judging by your rating, since I have nothing else to go on). 

MCO-15 is a decent one vol opening book that is fairly up-to-date (2008) and I think you'd do a lot better investing in a few books on middle and endgames instead IMHO. 

@ Crazychessplaya: Thanks, I'll have a look at Greet.

@ NimzoRoy: Thanks for your friendly advice. I don't know if rating is anything to judge by at this stage, as you always start on 1200 and I've been a member for only two weeks, finishing one game (a nice win which put me up to 1346).

But I agree, books on middle and endgames should definitely come before specialized opening books, although I think I got that bit decently covered with Silman's How to Reasses Your Chess and Shereshevsky's Endgame Strategies.

Sadler's book on the QGD and King/Ponzetto on the Ruy Lopez are excellent.

Ward's book is a good white QG repertoire.

 Note on Sadler's book: written definitely from the Black perspective, no coverage of some key lines (Tarrasch). It's a repertoire book essentially.

But the explanations are so great that you should still read it even though you only play the opening as white.

The best book on the Ruy Lopez, hands-down, is Mastering the Spanish: With the Read and Play Method by Danny King and Pietro Ponzetto.  It seems to be difficult to find, but the approach is fantastic.  Rather than just dropping a flurry of lines & variations like most opening books, it takes the approach of explaining the appropriate strategic plans & tactical motifs based on a variety of central pawn configurations -- the Exchange Center, Blocked Center, Fischer (Exchange) Center, etc.  Then it follows that up with heavily annotated illustrative games for each.  I started to play the Ruy Lopez because of this book, and have had great success with it ever since.  I wish all opening books were like this one!

i have play the queen's gambit by schandoff and i think its great. I had never played d4 in my life but after reading some of that book i can play it well enough for my level. it covers all the responses to the queen's gambit.

Well, I beg to disagree here. Though Sadler's is not a complete repertoire book (neither for white nor for black), there are plenty of explanations on the various plans available for both sides.

I've been using it to learn about typical pawn structures from the white perspective, and I think it can help tremendously in this regard.

This is just what I am looking for. Thanks for the information, Spiffe!

Mastering the Spanish: With the Read and Play Method by Danny King and Pietro Ponzetto it is then!

I like that a lot. Think I will have a stab at Sadler's book for the QGD. Thanks a lot for your input, guys!

Cheers

One more suggestion, this is a great DVD by Kasparov that you can use on either your PC or on a DVD player (the later volumes in the the series were PC-only). So if you just want to turn on the TV & watch, this is the thing:

The Greet book is all right, but be warned it is a repertoire book that covers a sideline and bypasses a lot of theory.  If you are looking for main line stuff you will be disappointed.

 +1. Greet focuses on the systems where white plays Qe2 early on.

 Greet explains himself in the Introduction as follows:

I have been playing the Ruy Lopez for many years (...) although (...) very few of my games in this opening have found their way onto the databases. (...) I would be the first to admit that this statistic does not do much for my credibility as an author on this opening!(...) But please take my word for it: my real-life experience with the Ruy Lopez (...) is far greater than a database search would indicate.

The book is not that bad!

Greet plays a sort of accelerated Wornall attack.  The normal move order for the Wornall is 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.O-O b5 6.Bb3 Be7 7.Qe2.  Greet plays 5.Qe2, if Black is cooperative and plays 5...b5 6.Bb3 Be7 then White can transpose with 7.O-O having by passed the Open Ruy and the Marshall Attack.  Problem is that Black can play 6...Bc5 and White is more or less forced to play 7.d3 with a restricted center. 

MacWall, this delves into an interesting question.  "Is opening study worth it?"  I say yes, but you should have a three prong approach.  First, everyone has to get better at end games.  There might be 12 guys who don't.  Then, middle games are where chess ability is most displayed.  Within middle games, you have to know when to be positional and when tactics are there.  Thankfully for middle and end games, I find chess mentor to be the best tool and better than any book.  Do chess mentor and those areas will improve. 

Now, openings.  You need to know what openings do and pick some that accentuate your strengths.  I don't buy this idea that you should open with games that give you cheap attacks, but that you'll have to give up at some stage.  If you put the time in, you can get to expert if you dedicate yourself truly.  Are you going to then beat experts with the Blackmar Diemer Gambit?  Or are you going to have to say "maybe it's time to shift to 2. c4."  The problem will then be that you've spent years learning and analyzing the Blackmar Diemer, but now you have to start over.  As my USCF performance ratings have gone from 1400 at age 14 to 2050 now, the other top player in my junior high who played Blackmar Diemer, has ZERO chances of surviving against me with it now. 

So, when you pick openings, what should you pick?  Are you better with center pawn pressure or pieces?  If pawns, pick QGAorD.  If pieces, pick 1. e4 and learn one sharp way to play against the Sicilian, French, Caro-Kann, Pirc, etc. etc.  

Do you play better with space or by playing back in smaller space?  If you play better with space, don't pick the Najdorf. 

Pick a couple, learn how to reply to all of the strong counter-attacks (for example, I play the Najdorf and those wishing to play Smith Morra better be ready for quite a ride), but don't spend more than 25% of your study time on this until you reach a high rating, say 1900+ USCF. 

Don't let anyone discourage you into studying middle games and playing the Larsen attack unless you don't mind starting over if you some day reach a point at which the Larsen attack will be methodically choked out by your equally rated competition...

Sadler's book isn't even remotely close to being a repertoire book.