Opening preparation in chess is always difficult and a lot of books have been written about this topic. The goal of this book is to illustrate how specific pawn structures should be studied for typical themes even if they arise from different openings. The pawn structure with (typically) White's isolated queen pawn on the 'd' file has been known for over a hundred years, and different players have shown best plans for both sides over the years. Historically, Mikhail Botvinnik popularized White's play, and positional players such as Karpov have performed well on the Black side of the same structure in several modern openings. At the same time, all strong modern grandmasters are well familiar with the principles of this pawn formation for both sides, and the goal of the book is to translate that knowledge on to the readers. Positions with isolated pawn test both positional and tactical skills of both sides. Despite the dynamic balance often present in these structures, whoever is more familiar with their ideas usually comes out on top. Given the wide prevalence of positions with isolated pawns, developing a skill for handling them is nearly guaranteed to improve your results, and the goal of this book is to guide an unfamiliar player through the basic ideas, as well as to explain the subtler points to those already familiar with the common plans in IQP structures. Tactical exercises throughout the book should reinforce the acquired knowledge. At the end of studying the material presented here, the reader should be able to not only find correct plans once the IQP structure appears on the board, but also correctly assess various transformations to and from the IQP positions and therefore be much more confident in a wide range of openings or structures that can lead to IQP or emerge from it. The publication is a follow up to the book 'The Break - Learn From Schlechter, Botvinnik and Kramnik', which also looks at various themes related to pawn structure.

Schliemann Defence is known as the Jaenisch Gambit especially in Russian literature, because it is considered that Carl Jaenisch was the first chess player to seriously analyze this response to 3.Bb5. It is an excellent practical choice for a chess player, because it leads to a rather special set of positions, that are not very familiar to most players on the White side, so an expert Black Schliemann player will often get to show off his or her better understanding of pawn structures and piece maneuver common to this variation, making it possible to take over the initiative and play for a win in every game. Today many strong chess players occasionally play it, with Teimour Radjabov being one of the main proponents. Levon Aronian has also tried it a few times, and other top players who have it in their repertoire include Vadim Zvjaginsev, Alexander Khalifman, Ivan Sokolov and Liviu Dieter Nisipeanu. Magnus Carlsen himself tried it on a couple of occasions. Among the players who played it in the previous decades, one can name Ventzislav Inkiov and Ratmir Kholmov. This is a second volume on the Schliemann; the first book Schliemann Defence: Volume 1 - Theory and Practice covers the theoretical lines and practical examples. This book, the second volume - focuses on the tactical aspects of the Schliemann, and most of the games are selected to fit within the repertoire or pawn structures suggested in the first volume. The book contains over 100 combinations and for each game, the reader will be able to both solve the critical position, as well as replay through the entire game if they are interested, as the full game text is also provided. Most of the tactics here come from the Black side, although there are a few positions that need to be solved for White, so beware of those too. How to Learn Typical Tactics - Follow up Book In order to play any chess opening well, one has to get a sense of typical patterns in the variations that one intends to adopt. This can be done roughly by following these steps: - find the common pawn structures - focus on games of players who frequently play this line (see the player index at the end of the book) - study their combinations and find the common patterns Interestingly, the games don't have to even come from very strong players. In fact, soon you can become that player as your own games will be full of these tactical shots! This follow up volume with over a hundred tactical positions should allow you to practice tactics typical for the Schliemann defence. Contents: 1. Introduction 2. How to Learn Typical Tactics - Follow up Book 3. Typical Themes 4. Early Deviations for White 5. System with 4.d3 6. System with 4.Bxc6 7. System with 4.Nc3 8. Odd Move orders 9. About the Author 10. Symbols and Abbreviations Used in the Book

There is an interesting paradox in the chess community - many coaches and teachers warn players of all levels against the excessive obsession with opening theory and yet the vast majority of chess materials in digital or printed form are dedicated to specific opening variations or positions. While everyone admits that memorizing variations will never guarantee success in over the board or online encounters, there is clearly a demand for products that help chess players of all levels to successfully navigate through the first stage of the game. At the same time, there is a lack of detailed discussion regarding how seasoned players (expert level and above) structure their work on chess openings, store their analysis, come up with new ideas, prepare for tournament games and so on. Rather than provide another set of variations, key positions and critical games in a specific opening area, this book is meant to fill this gap and help the reader to make sense from all the information that is out there and save as much time and energy as possible, while still building a bulletproof opening repertoire. The book is aimed at any chess player who wants to improve their opening play and is looking for some guidance in that area. Despite the large proliferation of computer chess software, there is a lack of explanation for how to tie to it effectively to one's study of openings. In the most advanced book on the subject, 'Opening Preparation', published in 1990s, the renowned coach Mark Dvoretsky, while giving great coverage for other topics, described the system for storing opening analysis on paper cards, with a side note that this was outdated and software should be used instead and that this was a large topic deserving a separate discussion. Since then there was a deafening silence on the subject in chess books, at least partially inspiring this publication, which outlines the system for storing opening analysis that served the author well for almost a decade. The goal of the book is to help the reader to increase their creativity in the opening phase of the game - both at home and during the games - whether you are a serious tournament player, or just play chess for fun at a club or on the Internet. Most of the plans and ideas are coming from Grandmaster games, with additional examples of preparation from the author's own master level games. Whether you enjoy opening preparation already, or it is your weak spot, I hope the book will give you some food for thought and practical suggestions applicable immediately upon reading the book. If rather than remember exact opening moves from the book examples, the reader is instead inspired to come up with their own ideas - the author's mission will be quite accomplished! Good opening preparation is all about picking the right direction for opening research and investing time into fine-tuning the understanding of favourable positions that are most likely to occur in our games. The basic premise throughout the book is to base one's opening preparation on 3 E's: Enjoyable - the positions that you analyze during opening preparation should appeal to your chess taste, and the process itself should feel pleasant and creative. See the section on 'Creativity' for more details. Effective - ultimately it should bring good results during tournament games, and be targeted at the positions that are most likely to occur on the board. This is covered under sections on Cutting Opponent's Options, Transpositions, and so on. Our choice of opening variations is more likely to make our work effective than anything else. Efficient - this is not as important as effectiveness, but we still don't want to waste time and analysis, so various computer tools are suggested to optimize the 'how' of opening analysis, save our work, and efficiently retrieve it. While it has plenty of examples and annotated games, this book deals with opening preparation in general. For books on specific openings, the reader might want to explore other books in the "Opening Preparation" Series: - Spanish Opening - Strategy and Tactics for White - Exchange Slav - Strategy and Tactics covers the particular opening and pawn structure for both sides - Isolated Queen Pawn: Strategy and Tactics spans multiple openings, but focuses on a single common pawn structure

Schliemann Defence is known as the Jaenisch Gambit especially in Russian literature, because it is considered that Carl Jaenisch was the first chess player to seriously analyze this response to 3.Bb5. It is an excellent practical choice for a chess player, because it leads to a rather special set of positions, that are not very familiar to most players on the White side, so an expert Black Schliemann player will often get to show off his better understanding of pawn structures and piece maneuver common to this variation, making it possible to take over the initiative and play for a win in every game. I suggest a careful study of illustrative games to better absorb those themes, in addition to practicing this opening in blitz and rapid games to get a better feel for them. Today many strong chess players occasionally play it, with Teimour Radjabov being one of the main proponents, as you will see in the example games. Levon Aronian has also tried it a few times, and other top players who have it in their repertoire include Vadim Zvjaginsev, Alexander Khalifman, Ivan Sokolov and Liviu Dieter Nisipeanu. Magnus Carlsen himself tried it on a couple of occasions. Among the players who played it in the previous decades, one can name Ventzislav Inkiov and Ratmir Kholmov. The player’s index at the end should be a starting point to finding key players and studying their games. Upon studying this book and adopting the Schliemann, you will discover that playing this line has the following benefits: - Black enforces his variation on White as early as the third move, and thus takes most of the theoretical battles to his own "home turf" - Black himself has to sharpen up his playing instincts from the very early stage of the game and play as concrete moves as possible, because theory tends to not go very far in the Schliemann; it is rare to be blitzing out theoretical lines anywhere past move 10, if not move 5 - The nature of arising positions, where Black most often has a strong center and/or two bishops - allows a player to develop a good sense of initiative if he or she does not have one already The same applies in positions where Black gambits a pawn and plays for compensation, either in the middlegame or in the endgame If one has not played similar risky sharp openings before, and/or has discarded gambits like the Schliemann as too positionally unsound - playing it will expand their positional horizons and broaden understanding of chess in general About this Book Note that this is a combined book that contains two previously published volumes - Schliemann Defence - Theory and Practice (Volume 1) and Schliemann Defence - Tactics and Combinations (Volume 2). While it does not contain any extra content, it gives the reader an extra convenience to have one book that they need to play the Schliemann with confidence. The book has also been completely reformatted for the printed edition with in terms of layout, structure, and diagram resolution. The improved table of contents will allow you to navigate around the material more easily and use the book three purposes: - As reference in the opening theory sections - For pleasure when studying the related illustrative games - For training in the tactics sections At the moment of writing (fall 2017) there has not been a dedicated book on the Schliemann in recent years, and this publication is meant to fill that gap. The book is structured in such a way that each section presents the theoretical variations, followed by some games by top players that illustrate the typical ideas for each variation. The first few sections are heavy on theory, as White tries to directly refute 3 ...f5, while the consequent chapters focus more on understanding typical ideas and pawn structures as White takes a more solid and positionally sound approach.

Schliemann Defence is known as the Jaenisch Gambit especially in Russian literature, because it is considered that Carl Jaenisch was the first chess player to seriously analyze this response to 3.Bb5. It is an excellent practical choice for a chess player, because it leads to a rather special set of positions, that are not very familiar to most players on the White side, so an expert Black Schliemann player will often get to show off his better understanding of pawn structures and piece maneuver common to this variation, making it possible to take over the initiative and play for a win in every game. I suggest a careful study of illustrative games to better absorb those themes, in addition to practicing this opening in blitz and rapid games to get a better feel for them. Today many strong chess players occasionally play it, with Teimour Radjabov being one of the main proponents, as you will see in the example games. Levon Aronian has also tried it a few times, and other top players who have it in their repertoire include Vadim Zvjaginsev, Alexander Khalifman, Ivan Sokolov and Liviu Dieter Nisipeanu. Magnus Carlsen himself tried it on a couple of occasions. Among the players who played it in the previous decades, one can name Ventzislav Inkiov and Ratmir Kholmov. The player's index at the end of the ebook should be a starting point to finding key players and studying their games. Upon studying this book and adopting the Schliemann, you will discover that playing this line has the following benefits: - Black enforces his variation on White as early as the third move, and thus takes most of the theoretical battles to his own "home turf" - Black himself has to sharpen up his playing instincts from the very early stage of the game and play as concrete moves as possible, because theory tends to not go very far in the Schliemann; it is rare to be blitzing out theoretical lines anywhere past move 10, if not move 5 - The nature of arising positions, where Black most often has a strong center and/or two bishops - allows a player to develop a good sense of initiative if he or she does not have one already - The same applies in positions where Black gambits a pawn and plays for compensation, either in the middlegame or in the endgame - If one has not played similar risky sharp openings before, and/or has discarded gambits like the Schliemann as too positionally unsound - playing it will expand their positional horizons and broaden understanding of chess in general There has not been a dedicated book on the Schliemann in recent years, and this publication is meant to fill that gap. The book is structured in such a way that each section presents the theoretical variations, followed by some games by top players that illustrate the typical ideas for each variation. The first few sections are heavy on theory, as White tries to directly refute 3 ...f5, while the consequent chapters focus more on understanding typical ideas and pawn structures as White takes a more solid and positionally sound approach.

From America’s foremost chess coach and game strategist for Netflix’s The Queen’s Gambit, Bruce Pandolfini brings us the most accessible and easy-to-use chess strategy book ever. Written for beginning and intermediate players, Weapons of Chess is the first encyclopedia of chess strategies that doesn't rely on the usual baffling chess notation. There are no symbolic chess moves, no charts or sequences in chess notation: every move is explained in words. Arranged alphabetically for easy use and based mainly on pawn formation, the incredibly detailed and thorough entries in this book talk a player through dozens of common strategic dilemmas, such as "doubled pawn," "bishops vs. knights," and "hanging pawn pair." Diagrams illustrate the terms, first showing the basic position and then strategically moving to more complicated versions of it. Players will learn how to formulate plans once they have reached a middlegame, enabling them to make wiser strategic decisions after the first few moves of the game. Designed for use as a ready reference during actual practice games, and usable without a chess board, Weapons of Chess is a unique and invaluable resource for any developing chess player.

Viktor Moskalenko is one of the leading chess instructors in the world. Not only has he coached Masters and Grandmasters, including Ukrainian star Vassily Ivanchuk, he has also taught hundreds of classes for amateurs and his best-selling books have inspired thousands of ambitious club players all over the world. Training with Moska is a based on the best instructive material Moskalenko collected while working with amateurs for three decades. The book covers a wide variety of aspects of the game and the more than 450 instructive positions are accessible for players of a wide range of strengths. If you have an ELO rating between 1400 and 2100, this book will help you make a big step forward. With his famous light touch and humour Moskalenko explains the themes and concepts of his countless subjects in great detail. Subsequently, he presents a multitude of typical examples and rounds off with large exams to test your understanding. As if you are attending one of his training sessions, your imagination and visualization will improve, you will learn to recognize the intentions of your opponent, you will find out how to select between options before you start to calculate, and much more. You will experience what thousands did before you: Training with Moska is not just very useful, it is a lot of fun as well!

A first-of-its-kind encyclopedia for chess players, this volume features detailed explanations and invaluable illustrations for new chess players, those intent on improving their games, and anyone who needs to brush up on both the basics and more advanced play. 140 detailed illustrations.

“First the idea and then the move!” Miguel Najdorf used to say in his habitually enthusiastic fashion; that statement is the perfect summary of planning in chess. Planning is of crucial importance in chess and yet this is an area that has not been well discussed or explained to ambitious players who wish to improve. A very well known saying in chess is “Better a bad plan than no plan at all”. Playing without a plan – effectively staggering from one move to the next – is a recipe for disaster. It is essential to have some kind of idea of what you are trying to achieve and how to go about it. However, planning is not a straightforward matter. A good plan might be very short, lasting just two or three moves. Another plan might require almost an entire game to implement. A plan can be highly ambitious and complex or somewhat modest and simple. In chess, as in life, circumstances can change quickly and when they do, new plans are needed. How is a player expected to juggle all these different concepts while dealing with the immediate problems posed by the opponent’s most recent move? In this book, grandmaster and experienced author Zenón Franco explains planning in detail. He organises material in terms of: typical structures, advantage in space, manoeuvring play, simplification and, finally attack and defence. Using games played by elite players he explains how plans are formed and carried out in these different scenarios. If you want to take your game to the next level, then Planning Move by Move will enable you to do this.

In chess, as in repair or construction jobs in and around the house, you will not get very far without the right equipment. If you want to win more games you simply need the right tools. Unfortunately, most amateur chess players have no toolbox to speak of. What’s more, they don’t even know which tools they actually need. Or what tools are available. In fact, if a chess hardware store would exist, most amateur chess players would be clueless what to ask for. International Master and experienced chess trainer Thomas Willemze is the handyman you are looking for. He tells you which are the most urgent problems that need fixing. In his no-nonsense guide, he presents essential techniques on how to mobilize your pieces in order to gain the upper hand. Willemze teaches you how to lift a blockade, get rid of an inferior piece, conquer an open file, eliminate an important defender, exploit the 7th rank, simplify your position (why and how), fight for entrance squares and much more. In order to make you feel comfortable and let you get used to these essential techniques, the author gives lots of fascinating examples and hundreds of instructive exercises. He even teaches you how to think outside your toolbox!