lThe sacrifice is one of the most beautiful, rewarding and complex aspects of chess. During a game the decision to give up material in order to get an advantage is probably the most difficult one a player has to take. Often, you have to burn your bridges without being able to fully calculate the consequences. Risks and rewards are racing through your mind, fighting for precedence while the clock keeps ticking. Now is the moment, because after the next move the window for this opportunity may be closed. In this book Ivan Sokolov presents a set of practical tools that will help you to master the art of sacrifice. By concentrating on the aim you are trying to achieve, rather than on the opening you are playing or the piece you might be going to sack, he teaches you how to come to a reasonable risk assessment and how to trust your intuition. There is a separate part on seizing the initiative without actually giving up material. Ivan Sokolov has written an entertaining and instructive guide, packed with useful advice and lots of practical examples.

"The beauty of a game of chess is usually appraised, and with good reason, according to the sacrifices it contains. On principle we incline to rate a sacrificial game more highly than a positional game. Instinctively we place the moral value above the scientific. We honor Capablanca, but our hearts beat higher when Morphy’s name is mentioned." — Introduction. Perhaps the strongest Austrian-born grandmaster of the20th century, Rudolf Spielmann (1883–1942) defeated such world-class opponents as Nimzovich, Tartakower, Bogoljubov — and even the great Capablanca. Among the reasons for his success was his mastery of the art of sacrifice. In this ground-breaking classic, distilled from 40 years of tournament play, he outlines the hard-won lessons that enable a player to win games by giving up pieces! Drawing on dozens of his own games against such topflight players as Schlechter, Tartakower, Bogoljubov, Reti, Rubinstein and Tarrasch, Spielmann describes and analysis various type of sacrifices: (positional, for gain, mating) and real sacrifices: (for development, obstructive, preventive, line-clearance, vacating, deflecting and more). The result was the first systematic attempt to explain and exploit the theory of chess sacrifice; it remains an extremely helpful and useful weapon in the arsenal of chess players at every level.

Against the widely played Queen’s Indian Defense White’s most ambitious and most popular choice is the Fianchetto Variation. Since the 1980’s the main response here for Black has been the Nimzowitsch Variation 4…La6, first played in 1925 by the famous theoretician Aron Nimzowitsch, in which Black tries to hinder White’s development by attacking the c4-pawn. In this position an ultra-sharp pawn sacrifice for White has in the past few years revolutionized the entire line. White’s gambit has been hotly debated in countless games both at grandmaster and at club level. With this book Hungarian Grandmaster Imre Hera enters an area in chess opening theory that is definitely in turmoil. Hera has not written an ordinary repertoire book, his principal goal was to provide a guide through the labyrinth of this exciting variation. Hera concentrates on resources for White and presents countless eye-catching novelties for that side, but he has also given many ways for Black to equalize. Hera has deeply analyzed this topical line and presents his conclusions and recommendations in full, with extensive verbal explanations. Lots of attention is paid to the ideas and plans behind the moves. This rich book will surprise masters and fascinate club players. ,

What Amateurs Can Learn from Ulf Andersson's Positional Masterpieces One of the most effective ways to improve your chess is to take a world class-player as your example. By collecting his games, studying his choices and examining his style, you will understand what made him rise to the very top. This is what Guido Kern and Jurgen Kaufeld have done with Swedish chess legend Ulf Andersson, a positional genius with a crystal-clear style, who rose to the number 4 spot of the FIDE world rankings. Kaufeld and Kern have selected 80 of Andersson’s games and grouped them into 15 thematic strategy lessons, pinpointing exactly how the Swede made the difference in each case. Their instructive verbal explanations will improve your strategic skills and your positional feeling. Every chess player knows how difficult it can be to convert an advantage into a win. Positional technique is what you need and Grandmaster Chess Strategy teaches you exactly that. Throughout the book the authors have selected dozens of test positions at particularly instructive stages of the games.

Chess Words of Wisdom is made up of the crucial information mined from over 400 chess books (plus hundreds of magazine articles, vides, DVDs, web sites and various other sources) all condensed into this one remarkably complete and "one-of-a-kind " chess book. Chess Words of Wisdom quotes, paraphrases and summarizes the teachings of hundreds of experts, masters, IMs, GMs and eve a few scientists, scholars and generals. Essentially, all of the wisdom from these important sources is in this one book! Chess Words of Wisdom is a digest of hundreds of years of chess knowledge from the greatest chess minds in history. This is the must-know information for the well-schooled chessplayer at all levels, from beginner to master. Chess Words of Wisdom is unique in that it is all text. There are no diagrams or analysis at all in the book. There is not a single game in the entire book! Instead, the book is jam-packed with essential chess knowledge... in plain English! If you want to learn, if you want to thoroughly understand chess, Chess Words of Wisdom is for you. Chess Words of Wisdom is about "understanding" chess. There are no frills, cartoons or nonsense of any kind in it... just intense, cover-to-cover, concentrated chess instruction in the form of verbal explanation. This is an ideal textbook for chess teachers, coaches, trainers and all serious students of the game. It is for players of all strengths who are enthusiastic about understanding and mastering the game of chess. A 534-page one-of-a-kind chess book, it belongs in every serious chessplayer's library. It contains all of the useful, practical, information from over 400 chess books (plus many other sources). As a result, it contains more helpful information than certainly any other chess book in history. This is one-volume treatise covers nearly all of the essential concepts in chess. "All you need to know about everything that matters!" (New In Chess Magazine) "Kudos! Just glanced through your book which displays an enormous amount of research and chess erudition. Looking forward to some enjoyable reading..." (the late Larry Evans, U.S. grandmaster, author, journalist, and five-time U.S. Chess Champion) "...it's definitely unique in its verbal approach, which is particularly useful especially to adults learning the game." (Jennifer Shahade, author, journalist, two-time U.S. Women's Chess Champion and FIDE Woman Grandmaster)

Mastering Positional Chess is a serious, but entertaining chess instruction book. Daniel started writing it when he realized that his lack of positional understanding was causing him to lose many games.

Two instructional classics condensed into one practical volume! In 2014 the Russian Chess Federation started a wide-ranging programme aimed at the revival of chess in Russia. One of the first actions that were taken was commissioning legendary Belarusian chess coach Mikhail Shereshevsky to recapitulate and condense his famous training methods. In doing so Shereshevsky has created a totally reworked compendium of his acclaimed classics Endgame Strategy and The Soviet Chess Conveyor, with many new examples, exercises and discussions of various training methods. Furthermore, he has added a new and highly effective approach on how to calculate variations. Club players all over the world who wish to improve their game now have access to Shereshevsky’s famous training programme in one volume and can learn: How to build an opening repertoire How to study the chess classics to maximum benefit How to master the most important endgame principles How to effectively and efficiently calculate variations The Shereshevsky Method offers a unique opportunity to improve your game with one of the supreme examples of Russian chess training excellence. Studying this manual will enrich your understanding of chess enormously and help your progress on the way to chess mastery.

Piece and Exchange Sacrifices is the third book in the Journal of Positional Chess Ideas series by Scott Elliott. This book is probably most helpful for tournament chess players centered around the class-B range. Scott believes the readers will learn how to sacrifice material intuitively with confidence.

Russia boasts a long and rich tradition in chess education, and Russian chess teachers and trainers are simply the best in the world. The Complete Manual of Positional Chess, probably the most thorough grounding in the history of teaching chess, was recently created for chess teachers at the DYSS, the special sports school for young talents in Moscow. Konstantin Sakaev and Konstantin Landa present a complete set of instructions and tips for trainers and self-improvers. You will learn not only how to enhance your fundamental knowledge and technical skills, but also how to work on your physical and psychological conditioning. In VOLUME 2 you are again handed basic and advanced tools to improve in a wide array of areas: assessing and handling pawn structures, employing positional and tactical means to improve your position, identifying weak spots, mastering attacking dynamics and more. If you complete Sakaev and Landa’s course you will be able to assess virtually any chess position you are confronted with. With its all-encompassing approach this ground-breaking book allows everyone to reap the fruits of the long tradition of instructive excellence in Russia.

Chess puzzle books are undoubtedly popular – and with good reason. Solving chess puzzles helps to sharpen a player’s tactical and combinational skills. This ability is absolutely fundamental for chess development. You won’t get better at tennis until you can consistently hit the ball with accuracy and you won’t get better at chess until you improve your ability to calculate. It is that simple and there are no shortcuts. Many puzzle books take a far too simplistic approach and offer endless positions where the solution is nearly always along the lines of: queen takes something check, king takes queen, check, check and a pretty mate. Aesthetically pleasing perhaps but of minimal use for actual improvement as the patterns are so familiar. Practical Chess Puzzles avoids this pitfall. The positions chosen are far more like those that actually appear on the board during the vast majority of games. Furthermore, at all stages, the puzzles are ranked, enabling the student to gauge progress and identify and correct weaknesses. * 600 puzzles featuring instructive, typically “game-like” positions * Model games featuring important instructional points * A ranking system to assess progress.