The classic 'My system' by Aaron Nimzowitsch has taken thousands of people to 1500/1600 over the last century. It's a little dated but packed full of useful advice.
I found Max Euwe's Classic manual 'Judgement and planning in chess' to be an extremely useful book indeed. He doesn't give any issolated examples, whenever a position is introduced it is given with the entire moves for that game. So, when he talks about the strength of a rook on the 7th rank, you can play through the whole game and see how this strategic idea affected the course of the whole game! I found this book extremely enjoyable and enlightening. 🙂
For class level players, 'knowing' the openings is not crucial. You should play using good opening principles, but don't worry about memorizing a bunch of openings and variations.
For class level players, the vast majority of games are decided by tactical ability (or lack thereof). Games between class level players contain too many tactical blunders for the opening to have much significance.
By 'class level' players, I refer collectively to those of us who are not (nor would we be, if we were members of USCF or FIDE) at the level of 'expert' or 'master'.
While it's possible to become an expert (i.e. USCF 2000+ I believe is the cutoff) without being able to identify a single opening by name (Michael de la Maza has done just that), it would be impossible to do so without killer tactical ability.
CT ART is a good tactical study software program. I have that one myself, it contains over 2,000 tactical problems, and if you don't solve the problem right away, the program gives you several hints along the way without giving away the solution...
There are also many books out which focus on tactics.... Seirawan's Winning Chess Tactics, Lazlo Polgar's 5,333 book (actually written by Susan Polgar)... Eric Schiller and Bruce Pandolfini have some tactics books as well.
"Win at Chess" by Ron Curry is another book I'd highly recommend. I haven't seen it in too many bookstores, but for an intermediate player such as yourself, I'd recommend that one very highly. Siliman's "Reassess" books are also good.
Improving your tactical ability will be the best and quickest way for you to improve your results...
Of course, I'm making these recommendations without reviewing any of your games... with recommendations coming from a lot of directions (which can be a good thing, that's what these forums are for) , if you're wondering which might be the best way for you to go, the best thing to do is get to a good bookstore and take a look as many of the recommended books from this thread as you can...
You're probably somewhat familiar with Bruce Pandolfini...Eric Schiller is a FIDE Master (I believe that's his current title).. over at chessgames.com, they have links to forums and games of a couple of thousand players, and Eric Schiller himself posts comments and interacts with site members on his threads (as do Susan Polgar and Raymond Keene). Anyway, Eric has a number of books out, I believe one of which is called "Killer Chess Tactics". I haven't seen the book myself, but you might want to check that one out as well.
But at your level, in order to improve you results, you should study tactics and not be so concerned with openings at this point.
Originally posted by TheBloopYou said some good stuff here for him except for one thing... When you told him:
For class level players, 'knowing' the openings is not crucial. You should play using good opening principles, but don't worry about memorizing a bunch of openings and variations.
For class level players, the vast majority of games are decided by tactical ability (or lack thereof). Games between class level players contain too many tactical blunders ...[text shortened]... prove you results, you should study tactics and not be so concerned with openings at this point.
"But at your level, in order to improve you results, you should study tactics and not be so concerned with openings at this point."
While it's true that players at this level should not spend time working on deep opening theory, they MUST understand the basics of opening theory. Such as DEVELOPMENT, CASTLING, BASIC OPENING MOVES.
I went in and looked over a few of his games and here's what I'd suggest:
Get a book on simple chess openings, such as CHESS MADE SIMPLE or one like that. After you (Pawnpower) understand the basic princples of openings then get yourself a book on tactics. Because what both TheBloop and myself have noticed that you can benefit by a book on tactics. But you have to survive the opening first!
Originally posted by arrakisyou're right, but that's what I meant when I said in the first paragraph that one should learn to play good opening principles... i probably should have elaborated on that, but what you said is exactly what I meant... development, castling, king safety,etc.
You said some good stuff here for him except for one thing... When you told him:
"But at your level, in order to improve you results, you should study tactics and not be so concerned with openings at this point."
While it's true that players at this level should not spend time working on deep opening theory, they MUST understand the basics of open ...[text shortened]... ticed that you can benefit by a book on tactics. But you have to survive the opening first!
I have a book called "How to play good opening moves" by Edmar Mednis, which is a pretty good book. I bought it years ago in descriptive notation, and i recently picked up the algebraic version of the same book.
What i meant was that a player does not have to know, for example, what the Ruy Lopez or the French Defense are (in terms of identifying it by name and knowing all of the moves). But it is crucial to play good opening principles... as in 'try to only move a couple of pawns in the opening', castle early (but not necessarily too early, as it is sometimes better to wait to see where your King will be safer), develop your pieces before you start your attack, try not to move the same piece more than once in the opening, develop knights before bishops, etc.
If one plays good opening principles, they'll be just fine when they get to the middle game. There is no opening which wins a piece by force, so if a player finds themselves down a piece by move 10 on a consistent basis, it's because they are being outplayed tactically.
I'm finding more and more teachers saying that studying openings (as in memorizing every variation of this opening or that opening) is not the best way for beginning-intermediate level players to spend their time. Kasparov himself has said that openings really don't matter at the beginning level (because it is tactical errors which decides the outcomes of the vast majority of games between class players).
To echo a couple of other posters, I would definitely recommend Seirawan's entire series, but probably in this study order (1) Endings (2) Tactics (3) Strategies (4) Brilliancies (5) Openings
Originally posted by PawnpowerI had a good chess book, and I can advise you that it was written for people who are rated at 1350 and who are not improving, I dont know what it is called as I eat it.
I have a rating of around 1350 and am not improving. Can anyone advise a good chess book considering this rating?
