Chess Books A Waste of Money?

If you look at any book you will basically simply see a collection of games giving specific examples of the material covered. Wouldnt it be cheaper to just study the games yourself? Are chess books a waste of money?

I think that among my 200-250 chess books I have one that matches your description. I've thought about giving it away, but it is thin and takes minimal space on the shelf.

What book is that?

If you're talking about paper books, then, considering that most people nowadays seem to be doing most things by staring at rectangles and pushing buttons (with the latter supposedly being to be replaced by just pawing and palpating the very same rectangle they are staring at), you might think so.

I like reading chess books for fun, I'm not sure if I've improved a lot from them.

@Ziryab

What a perfect response!  I was going to huff and puff, and display suitable outrage, and cast character aspersions, and in general just show what a gullible #ss I am.  Thanks for saving me from all that...

Not one bit.

Books providing an in-depth analysis of master games are invaluable. As a kid I'd go over this one old book covering Russian GM games up to the 1960's.

This'll be old news to many of you but I'd play with the winning side and hide the moves with a card. I'd try to figure out what the masters would do and only then reveal the move and study the analysis/commentary provided. Going over master games without an explanation would be waste of time for anyone trying to learn chess - like trying to understand another language without a translation.

I never played OTB or computers or anyone (we lived in the bush) and eventually gave it up when I hit high school and started chasing girls.

I'm in my early 30s now and after all this time only just started playing last year. Suprisingly I was a relatively strong(ish) player and after only a few months was improving very quickly.

Studying and absorbing master games is the best way to develop strong chess intuition and good thought processes. On top of that, endgames and opening study are also helpful in complementing the skill of any enthusiastic amature.

It is a collection of Joel Benjamin's games published as part of a series called Grandmaster Profiles. It was published in the late 1990s before most folks had databases.

In truth, however, even this book does not match the OP's description. A dozen games have fairly detailed annotations, and a quite a few more have light annotations.

I'm reading Capablanca's Chess Fundamentals on my phone, but I have a hard cover copy published in 1934 too. Occasionally, I cross reference them to verify that the ebook did not leave anything out. The text in easier in the printed book. The notation is easier by clicking through it on the e+Chess Reader app.

Petrosian the Powerful by Soltis and Smith is a lot less then I expected when annotating a world champion's games.

Bobby Fisher Teaches Chess is a waste of paper.

Complete Defense to King Pawn Openings by Schiller and English Attack by deFirmian and Fedorowicz are opening books that I honestly don't mind that my copy of them has rat piss on it.

But other then that, I have not come accrose a chess book that is completly useless.

Lots of good books around.  Most of the threads suck.  No accountability, and entirely too much posturing, unfortunately.  

Nowadays one can download thousands of books fromo the internet for free using Bit Torrent. But IMHO its easier to learn chess by using Tactics Trainer and Chess Mentor and watching the videos. 

I think books get a bad name because players do not realize the amount of effort that must be put in to actually gain significant rating points. And that gaining a higher rating does not happen overnight

I have a copy of "How to Play Chess" by Philidor dated 1795. I bought it for $40 many years ago. I'll tell you if it was a waste of money when I sell it.

awesome, i looked for that book i couldnt even find a reprint on amazon. Actually i couldnt find any philidor book except for his biography. i bet it will be worth a lot

I bought it for its historical interest when I was accumulating a Chess library. It may still only be worth $40, rare books are difficult to value. As a 200+ year old book it may be worth little, but as a 200 year old Chess book it could be valuable to the right person. Its an interesting read from a historical perspective but I wouldn't recomend it for actual study, there are far better books out there for beginners. One I still recomend is Chess made Easy by Purdy & Koshnitsky. An Australian publication. It may be out of print but I still see copies around & although published originally in 1942 it will still get someone who has just learnt the moves off to a good start.

A book with paragraphs and many illustrations is good, a book with pages and pages of lines with minimal explanations are a waste of time.

It depends. To me probably yes.

i always thought it would be totally awesome for learning.