Best Books

I am sure this has been posted several hundred times.

What where the best chess books for learning from you guys.

Taking for granted we leave opening books out.

Just buy anything by Eric Schiller or Ray Keene and you'll be fine.

Not to hip on Schiller. Never liked his stuff much.

Not sure on Keene

Anybody have anything else

Originally posted by 1shooter
Not to hip on Schiller. Never liked his stuff much.

Not sure on Keene

Anybody have anything else

Keene and Schiller are probably the worst chess hacks out there,their books, for the most part,are nothing but rubbish. Try books by Chernev,Euwe,Purdy.

heard good stuff about Cherenv Cant go wrong with Euwe never heard of Purdy. Whats his stuff about.

I'm siding with Data Fly.

Buy everything co written by Schiller & Keene.

Then every book you buy after that will be good...very good. 🙂

I can ony rec books I know gave me a leg up.
Chernev. 'The Most Instructive Games Ever Played'.

Originally posted by 1shooter
heard good stuff about Cherenv Cant go wrong with Euwe never heard of Purdy. Whats his stuff about.

Chernev's best was Winning Chess: How to see 3 Moves Ahead and Capablancas 60 Best Endings. Purdy was former World Correspondence Chess Champion. His books are great,clear,easy to read,and instructive. Just look for titles under his name C.J. Purdy. I re-iterate-Schiller is nothing but a data base download hack,and Keene is the biggest butt-kisser of all time,the way he was always licking Kasparov's boots was nauseating. He did write one good book about Nimzovitch,but that's about it.

Originally posted by 1shooter
I am sure this has been posted several hundred times.

What where the best chess books for learning from you guys.

Taking for granted we leave opening books out.

Soltis, Pawn structure chess, Reti, Masters of the chessboard.

I wonder how relevant chess books are nowadays? For £50 or so a year you can get a premium subscription to playchess.com and have access to dozens of videos of very strong players explaining ideas and techniques in nice, bite-size chunks. Then there's the free game collections and databases on chessgames.com and others. And of course actually playing chess is the best way of all to try out stuff you've learnt, and there are loads of excellent ways of doing that on the internet.

Nowadays if I read a chess book it tends to be for fun, something like "Chess Treasury of the Air". But even then I probably spend far more time on Edward Winters' site (chesshistory.com) than I do reading all my chess books put together.

I like the computer for tactics can't get much better.

But for strategy stuff books seems to be better for me.

Bite size chunks turn out to be that for me. A bit here and there.

Where the book guides me through a complete thought process.

I watch videos for fun but I never learn much.

Hi Data Fly.

I think there is something about actually playing the move on the
board and seeing everything in 3d that makes it stick.
Especiallly the patterns

Watching vids and DVD's then the mind can slip in TV mode.
(Television is chewing gum for the mind is a good description.)

Also if I want to re-check something, have an idea or simply disagree
then it take seconds to open a book and start discussing with it.
(scribbling in the notes and examining what is going on).

Vid's & DVD's are no good for this and some are truly awful, I cannot
listen to that slow, listless,unenthusiastic American accent which seems to
be everywhere for more than a few minutes without switching it off.
They make chess sound boring.

Andrew Martin's are good, I watch them from time to time.

Owning a book and you have something solid, something that exists.
Not a endless stream of glib that can just disappear into the ether.
I liken them to cartoons and those I have done (all naff really)
try to reflect that.

YouTube

(Boxed DVD's are a rip off. They cost less to produce than books, easier to
do than books and their content is often a lot less than most books - yet they often cost more than a book.)

Books are Best. Just you a book and a board. Bliss.

Often on Winter's site myself but I also have all his books and I find this
way much more enjoyable than peering at a screen.

Originally posted by greenpawn34
Hi Data Fly.

I think there is something about actually playing the move on the
board and seeing everything in 3d that makes it stick.
Especiallly the patterns

Watching vids and DVD's then the mind can slip in TV mode.
(Television is chewing gum for the mind is a good description.)

Also if I want to re-check something, have an idea or simply ...[text shortened]... but I also have all his books and I find this
way much more enjoyable than peering at a screen.

I have often thought about this and it seems to me that there are two elements, one is a generation thing, our generation are used to reading books, visiting the public library, this generation are plugged into the net via apple products, so there is that aspect, but on an actual learning level it is one thing to know something in chess (for example that two bishops are considered an advantage) quite another to know how to use two bishops in a game.

Now as chess is learned to a very large degree subliminally we cannot learn it the same as mathematics, or engineering or web design, it needs to be experienced and for that, taking the time to fully digest material in a book is no substitute. Playing through the moves, analysing the positions, trying to understand what is going on is surely the best. Chess videos on the other hand largely spoon-feed information, yes there are those which ask the viewer to pause the video and to think about the position but these are few and far between and it must be noted that not all strong players are good teachers the same as not all great footballers make good managers.

I have learnt a great deal from chess videos but only because i have been prepared to pause the video, copy down the moves and think about the ideas and concepts, otherwise one would be as well as simply going to lichess.org and watch the blitz games for entertainment sake only.

I think that the fourth edition of Jeremy Silman's "How to Reassess Your Chess" (2010) has helped improve my awareness of piece activity.

Hi Robbie,

I am not going to fire up a computer, search all over the net for a vid,
scroll along and watch again a particular segment.

Much easier to pick up a book and there you are.
I can also remember notes and games I read and played over 40 years ago.
I bet there are some old timers on here who can do the same.

The jury is out on DVD's let me know what you recall in 40 years.

I also don't think this modern gadget and gizmo age has really anything
going for it except encouraging sheer laziness.

If the fridge was closer to the telly some people would get no excercise at all.

I see people are now smoking electronic cigarettes. You have to ask yourself
what have you become when you feel the need to smoke an electronic cigarette.

Hi Linden,

Good. If it helped you then rec it. It's really only honest 'I have read this book' opinions the lad is after.

Found this article, thought you might enjoy it

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/americans-prefer-print-books-over-e-books/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=pbsofficial&utm_campaign=newshour