Originally posted by bosintang
I don't speak for *every* endgame book obviously, but the ones I've tried I've usually felt lacking. They were either too easy or too difficult. They've usually felt like a collection of puzzles that felt more theoretical and academic than knowledge that has immediate pay-off in the here and now of someone with my skill level. (For example solving the K ...[text shortened]... es for different people. And if Silman's course is not your cup of tea, then that's fine.
I totally agree with you about Silman's book missing out the K,N,B V's K ending (which is covered very well in Seirawans book)....especially as there is the spin off benefit of learning to co-ordinate the B & N.
For a tip someone passed on to me in another thread...there is a bot on ICC where you can practice this ending...it can be quite a laugh as it tells you "checkmate in 26 moves...checkmate in 25 moves ...etc. and then you can see if you can do it in 26 moves.
However when I cracked this and was feeling very proud of the accomplishment it occurred to me that it is probably easier to learn this against best play...as it follows a repeatable pattern than against a not quite so good defense. The reason is that if someone takes you out of the pattern (by playing a weaker move) and you can't take advantage of it (because the pattern has changed) then you may well jump back from say a checkmate in 10 to a checkmate in 26 again..and run out of moves under the 50 move rule.
As for endgame books they all seem to claim not to be dry dull endings books!
For quick digestible " golden nuggetts of endgame wisdom" - it says this on the cover - there is "101 Chess Endgame Tips" by Steve Giddins (Gambit) and also worth a look and in a similar vein is "Improve Your Endgame Play" by Glen Flear (Everyman Chess) and "Starting Out: Rook Endgames" by Chris Ward
I also have "Grandmaster Secrets Endings" by Andrew Soltis which has a lot of fun banter about errr...how fun endgame's can be and how you don't need to spend countless hours working through weighty tomes covering positions you'll probably never meet. It comes complete with caricatures and a sometimes banal dialog between the imaginary Noah Tall a veteran Grandmaster and Pat Sayre an enthusiastic young amateur ...but I couldn't get into it so have put it aside to read at a later date.