Danish gambit

I just think that it's better for enthiusiastic amateurs to write books on openings such as the Latvian which are suspect at top levels of chess but playable to an extent at lower levels.[/b]

That's a nice sentiment but I just don't see why it can't also be a reasonable and honest way for a chess professional to earn some money doing this...especially if they are willing to put a lot of work in to make it a good book. OK - if the GM is making false claims about a line of play then that's a different matter...

Originally posted by Mahout
That's a nice sentiment but I just don't see why it can't also be a reasonable and honest way for a chess professional to earn some money doing this...especially if they are willing to put a lot of work in to make it a good book. OK - if the GM is making false claims about a line of play then that's a different matter...

...which is exactly the point I was making!

Capablanca - Corzo, Correspondence game 1911 (w/notes by Corzo)

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1361087

As promised after posting a precis of the comments on his book to the forum on Tony Kosten's website (www.improveyourchess.com) here is how he replied:

"Interesting, I don't think I was ever derided by John Nunn, as I seem to remember he said the book was good, he just found a couple of improvements for NCO and wanted to publicise them to sell more copies!
As far as I am aware the book was very popular with Latvian fans, and sold quite well.
Yes, I played it quite a lot for a while, and even played a thematic tournament!"

....well he didn't contest the point about the line being strong for white after 3.Nxe5

Originally posted by Northern Lad
I still think it a little dodgy to write books on openings you never play yourself. How can you have a real feel for it? Another example was Tony Kosten, who wrote not one, but two(!) books on the Latvian (Greco) Counter Gambit and was publicly derided by John Nunn for doing so.

This is a very strange choice of example, as not only I did play the opening myself, but the book is also very good! At least I got very good reviews for it.
I was never publicly derided by John Nunn or anyone else, where did you get this from?
One other point to be noted is that it is a manual not a repertoire book, I made no false claims of any sort, if you have a copy it is odd you don't even seem to have read the introduction!

Originally posted by TonyK
This is a very strange choice of example, as not only I did play the opening myself, but the book is also very good! At least I got very good reviews for it.
I was never publicly derided by John Nunn or anyone else, where did you get this from?
One other point to be noted is that it is a manual not a repertoire book, I made no false claims of any sort, if you have a copy it is odd you don't even seem to have read the introduction!

Wow...
GM Kosten on the site defending his work.
If that is you, well done on The Latvian Gambit Lives! A useful resource in an opening that doesn't get much coverage.

p.s
Fancy knocking Weyerstrass off the #1 spot?
😉

Originally posted by Squelchbelch
Wow...
GM Kosten on the site defending his work.
If that is you, well done on The Latvian Gambit Lives! A useful resource in an opening that doesn't get much coverage.

p.s
Fancy knocking Weyerstrass off the #1 spot?
😉

Thanks for the compliment, but who is Weyerstrass?

User 91723
Ronald Weyerstrass.
Dutch CC specialist.