CHESSBOOK REVIEWS

Latest book reviews of 1 June 2021

Wilhelminalaan 33 

7261 BP RUURLO 

The Netherlands.
           John Elburg


 
                                                                                                                           Chess Books
      
Desert Island Chess Puzzle Omnibus by Wesley So, Michael Adams, John Nunn and Graham Burgess
2021
Gambit Publications Ltd
http://www.gambitbooks.com
E-mail info@gambitbooks.com
318 pages
Price €25,45
ISBN (13 digits):978-1-911465-65-2 


Desert Island chess puzzle omnibus is more than a normal chess puzzles book,first of all this book holds a carefully chosen collection of 400 puzzles,
which are all,one for one over loaded with tactical creativity.
Impressive is the contribution of  the four authors: Wesley So, Michael Adams, John Nunn and Graham Burgess.
First of all Wesley So is responsible with 100 puzzles from his own recent games,and that makes it all very special, for example,please see his game position between Wesley
So and Hikaru Nakamura,where only one move  holds the draw! And it this is not a easy task!
By the way the excellent explanation,of this game is good for over one page of higly instructive text!
Michael Adams,offers us in this book material  that he simple liked for the instructive value.
And he does not throw the beginning chess student for the wolves but pleasantly leads the reader as an experienced  master of explanation with warming ups,and easy puzzles to more complicated chess exercises,yes these hard challenges are no easy walkthrough!
John Nunn does not only sharpen your skills with clear tactics and tough puzzles but has kept place for some thrilling studies.
And the contribution of Graham Burgess is spectacular with fun puzzles, tricky opening themes, defensive tasks and hard case puzzles  to solve.
A fine example of Burgess fun examples is  the following piece lost in 6 moves: Marshall,Ian H - Henderson,J [D01]BPCF corr, 1993
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nc3 d5 3.Bg5 Nbd7 4.e3 g6 5.Qf3 Bg7 6.Nxd5 Nxd5 7.Qxd5 c6!
Yes even in a correspondence chess game you can loose in no time!
Worth mentioning is the excellent made index of composers and players.
Certainly one of the best made puzzle books I have ever seen! 
                                                                                            
          Chess CD's

Opening Encyclopaedia 2021
ChessBase
 http://www.chessbase.com
E-Mail info@chessbase.com
Price €99.90
System requirements (Minimum): Desktop PC or Notebook, Windows 10, 8.1, 2 GB RAM, and Fritz 14, 15, 16, 17 or ChessBase 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 and DVD drive for DVDs / for Downloads no DVD drive required.


First of all the new Opening Encyclopaedia 2021  is a collection of all the opening articles from all the previous issues of the well known ChessBase Magazines and covers
all together over  1200 surveys and 66 new opening articles as well as 349 new opening surveys have been added for this heavy loaded 2021 opening edition.
Use a database program as ChessBase to access all tutorials and articles with only a few clicks of your mouse.Compare that for example with all the New in Chess Opening surveys,there
you will need days to find your favourite line!
Under the main categories “Open games”, “Semi-open games”, “Closed openings”, “Semi closed openings”, “English Opening and Reti” and “Flank openings” you will find all the recommendations and analyses classified according to the names of the openings.
But there is also over 22 hours video entertainment,and that is good for around 60 opening files, 7,127 opening surveys, where 349 of them are new and created  by no less than GM Lubomir Ftacnik.
For example click on opening tutorials,Spanish Main lines,Marshall and Anti -Marshall and I can isure you here is more and better material than any printed book!
And I did not mention the database with all 39000 games from the opening articles.
Interesting to mention is also ideas  for your repertoire,again with one simple click you will find a wealth of suggested lines!
This Opening Encyclopaedia 2021  gives the user a wealth of chess knowledge, and no other publication can come close to this impressive made chess product.
Conclusion: This Opening Encyclopaedia is unbelievable good!

The flexible Open Spanish
by  Sipke Ernst
2021
http://www.chessbase.com
E-Mail info@chessbase.com
Price Euro 29.90
Windows 7 or higher
Minimum: Dual Core, 2 GB RAM, DirectX11, graphics card with 256 MB RAM, DVD-ROM drive, Windows Media Player 9, ChessBase 14/Fritz 16 or included Reader and internet access for program activation. Recommended: PC Intel i5 (Quadcore), 4 GB RAM, Windows 10, DirectX11, graphics card with 512 MB RAM or more, 100% DirectX10-compatible sound card, Windows Media Player 11, DVD-ROM drive and internet access for program activation.
MacOSX  only available as download! Minimum: MacOS "Yosemite" 10.10


The Dutch grandmaster Ernst Spike provides the user of this download with an 4 hour extensive  repertoire coverage of the good old Open Spanish, great fighting players as Victor Korchnoi and Jan Timman has used the Open Ruy Lopez in there repertoires. But the  Open Spanish starts with Dr.Siegbert Tarrasch 1862-1934 who believed in active piece play even at the cost of weakend pawns.
Interesting enough the great Vishy Anand employed the Open Spanish in his World Championship match against Garry Kasparov in 1995.
In big lines you will find the following index files:
Introduction
Main Line 9.Nbd2
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.O-O Nxe4 6.d4 b5 7.Bb3 d5 8.dxe5 Be6 9.Nbd2
9...Nc5 10.c3 Be7 11.Bc2 d4 12.Nb3
9...Nc5 10.c3 Be7 11.Bc2 d4 12.Ne4
Alternatives
9.c3
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.O-O Nxe4 6.d4 b5 7.Bb3 d5 8.dxe5 Be6 9.c3
Dillworth Attack: 9...Bc5 10.Nbd2 O-O 11.Bc2 Nxf2
9...Bc5 10.Nbd2 O-O 11.Bc2 - Alternative 11th moves
9...Bc5 10.Qd3/Qe2
9...Be7
9.Be3
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.O-O Nxe4 6.d4 b5 7.Bb3 d5 8.dxe5 Be6 9.Be3
9...Be7 10.c3 O-O 11.Nbd2 Qd7 12.Re1
9...Be7 10.c3 O-O 11.Nbd2 Qd7 12.Bc2
9.Qe2
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.O-O Nxe4 6.d4 b5 7.Bb3 d5 8.dxe5 Be6 9.Qe2
9...Be7 10.Rd1 O-O 11.c4 bxc4 12.Bxc4 Bc5 13.Be3 Bxe3 14.Qxe3 Qb8 15.Bb3 Na5 16.Nbd2
Alternatives
Sidelines
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.O-O Nxe4 6.d4 b5 7.Bb3 d5 8.dxe5 Be6
9th move alternatives
8.Nxe5
7th move alternatives
6.Re1
5.d3
5th move alternatives
Exchange Variation 4.Bxc6 plus exercise, where you can do special training with ChessBase apps, memorize the opening repertoire and play key positions against Fritz on various levels.
Conclusion: High quality ChessBase material!

ChessBase Magazine issue 201
May/ June  2021
ChessBase
 http://www.chessbase.com
E-Mail info@chessbase.com
ISSN 1432-8992
Euro 19.95
System requirements:
Minimum: Pentium III 1 GHz, 1 GB RAM, Windows Vista, XP (Service Pack 3), DirectX9 graphic card with 256 MB RAM, DVD-ROM drive, Windows Media Player 9, ChessBase 12/Fritz 13 or included Reader and internet connection for program activation. Recommended: PC Intel Core i7, 2.8 GHz, 4 GB RAM, Windows 8.1 or Windows 10, DirectX10 graphic card (or compatible) with 512 MB RAM or better


The master file of this ChessBase issue 201 is good for 507 entries and where a small 34 of them are more than excellent analysed, a fine example of this is the following that I found here:
Dubov,Daniil (2710) - So,Wesley (2770) [E06]
Carlsen Inv Prelim chess24.com INT (7), 14.03.2021
[So,Wesley]
This game was played in the 7th round of the Magnus Carlsen Invitational. As usual I am always excited to play in these events and had prepared seriously for this leg. At this stage I had +1 at that point and I wanted to play it safe, but at the same time I knew that Daniil always goes all out for his games. He is always looking for the most interesting fighting positions. I got rmyself ready to play a complex game.
1.d4 Besides this Daniil also showed an interesting idea with 1.e4. In this game he decided to stick to his favorite Catalan opening. 1...Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 d5 4.g3 Be7 5.Bg2 0-0 6.0-0 dxc4 7.Na3 This came as a surprise, although I remember having checked this line not so long ago. Jeffery Xiong and Le Quang Liem had used it in the World Cup 2019. This move does not give White anything objectively. I don't think 7.î?¨a3 will become popular anytime soon. 7...Bxa3 8.bxa3 Bd7 This reply is simple enough. Black simply activates his passive bishop on the back rank. [Levon chose against Le Quang Liem the move 8...b5 9.a4 a6 10.Ne5 Nd5 11.Ba3 Re8 12.e4 but here White has enough compensation for the pawn, and Black needs to play accurately. 12...Ne7 13.Qh5 Ng6 14.Rad1© Le,Q (2708)-Aronian,L (2758) Khanty-Mansiysk 2019] 9.Ne5 This is White's idea in the variation, as he seizes the bishop pair. 9...Bc6 10.Nxc6 Nxc6 11.Bb2 [The computer's recommendation is 11.Bxc6 bxc6 12.Bg5 but it's hard to imagine that White has anything here. Teimour Radjabov made an easy draw with Black after 12...h6 13.Bxf6 Qxf6] 11...Nd5 Black defends his extra pawn on c4 with ...î?¨b6. The position is more or less level. White has two strong bishops in return for his sacrificed pawn.
12.Rc1 Nb6 I think this is the simplest decision, since after 12...b5 White can immediately open up the centre with 13.e4 followed by d5.
13.e3 We reached this position quite quickly, as I assume we were still both following our preparation. 13...Qe7 A normal square for the queen, although ...î?¥d7 was probably slightly more accurate in order to reserve e7 for my knight. A normal square for the queen, although ...î?¥d7 was probably slightly more accurate in order to reserve e7 for my knight.
14.Qc2 Rfe8?! A slight mouse slip. I actually wanted to play here 14...î?¦fd8 here and double the rooks along the d-file, but I accidentally dropped my rook over to e8. Anyway no harm done as the loss of a tempo does not change things significantly in the position.
15.Rfd1 [15.Qc3 can be met for instance by ...î?¥f8, or even 15...f5 when White has compensation for the pawn, but no more than that.] 15...Rad8 It is not easy to make progress with White or find good ideas for him.
16.h4 [White can regain the sacrificed pawn with 16.Bf1 but that means he has to surrender the bishop pair for it. Besides other moves, Black can completely equalise with 16...e5 17.Bxc4 exd4 18.exd4 Nxc4 19.Qxc4 Qe4 forcing liquidation over the position.] 16...h6 17.Rd2 [17.Bf1 e5 18.dxe5 Nxe5= does not give White anything.] 17...Rd7 White can double rooks along the d-file, but I can do the same. [I have another good alternative here which is 17...e5 now 18.d5 î?¨b8 leads nowhere as Black has ...c6, meanwhile after 18.Bxc6 bxc6 19.dxe5 Qe6 White regains his sacrificed pawn, but Black is too solid after ...î?¦d5 next move.] 18.Qc3?! This move does not threaten anything. [It was already time to secure equality with 18.e4 Red8 19.Rcd1= White also has to be careful not to end up worse, after all he is down a pawn.] 18...Red8! Using the pin along the d-file, Black is not worried about d5. I could also have started with 18...f5 first.
19.Rcd1 [19.d5 can just be met by 19...f6 when the rook on d2 is hanging.] 19...f5 This protects the crucial g7-square and in addition it takes control of some light squares in the centre.
20.Ba1 [20.a4 Qb4³ forces the exchange of queens in a better position.] 20...a5 I wasn't sure exactly what to play, so I made a useful semi waiting move. Securing the position of my knights on the queenside.
21.e4?! Daniil decides to force matters in the centre, but it does not lead anywhere as now his d-pawn is quite vulnerable. [I was not afraid of 21.Bxc6 bxc6 22.Qxa5 Ra8 regaining the pawn on the a-file.;
A bit stronger was 21.Rb1 applying some pressure on the b-file and targeting my knights.;
Maybe also 21.Bf1 deserves attention, but it is not in Daniil's style to play passively.] 21...fxe4 22.Bxe4 Qf6 23.Kg2 The king does not do anything on g2, and in fact it later becomes vulnerable there after I am able to reposition my knights towards the kingside. [23.Bb1!? makes sense, and is what I was expecting. White is threatening î?¥c2. In the worst case I can just move my king to f8, but that's not an easy move to make. I think practically speaking î?§b1 was the way to go.] 23...a4 [23...Ne7! with the idea of ...î?¨ed5 is much stronger, when Black is totally in control. After 24.Qxa5 Nbd5 25.Qc5 Nf5 White's king is under serious trouble on the kingside.] 24.Re1? White's position was already very difficult, but this makes things easier for me. 24...Nxd4 25.Bxb7 c6 [This is good enough. Even stronger is 25...e5! when Black has too many threats, including ...c6, ...î?¨f3, and ...î?¨b5.] 26.Red1? Perhaps White could have defended better here by playing 26.î?¦xd4 or 26.î?¦b1. Now Black's position plays itself. [26.Ba6 this loses material thanks to 26...Qf3+ 27.Qxf3 Nxf3 and Black takes on e1 next move with check.] 26...e5 27.Ba6 Kh8 White's problem is that his bishop on a6 is completely misplaced and his king is very vulnerable. My pieces are too close to his king.
28.Bxc4 Nxc4 29.Qxc4 Qf3+ 30.Kh3 Qf5+ Giving one check just to gain time.
31.Kg2 Qf3+ 32.Kh3 Ne2! A very nice tactical motif, and it wins some heavy material.
33.Rxd7 [White can try 33.Qxe2 Qxe2 34.Rxe2 Rxd1 35.Bc3 but this ending is totally lost in any case.] 33...Rxd7 34.Rxd7 Nf4+ Black wins the queen by force. 35.Qxf4 exf4 36.Bxg7+ Kh7 [And not 36...Kg8? 37.Bxh6 fxg3 38.Rg7+ Kh8 39.Rxg3 when White is able to defend all his forces.] 37.Bd4+ Kg8 White is completely lost here because both he is unable to hang on to his bishop. Both his rook and bishop are unprotected and vulnerable.
38.Kh2 fxg3+ 39.fxg3 Qe2+ 40.Kg1 Qd1+ 41.Kh2 c5 White loses his bishop now.
42.Rg7+ Kf8 43.Bf6 Qe2+ 44.Kg1 Qe1+ 45.Kg2 Qe4+ 46.Kh2 Qf5 47.Ba1 Qf2+ 48.Kh3 Qf1+ and White resigned. A very fascinating game, and one which I enjoyed immensely. This win helped secure my qualification for the top 8. 0-1.
Other highlights are:
Expert videos by
Jan Werle, Rustam Kasimdzhanov and Mihail Marin explain smashing  new opening ideas in just 30 minutes
Special: Vassily Ivanchuk - “just a genius!”
22 games of the Ukrainian star, annotated by CBM authors
All in One: Grand Prix Attack á la Grischuk  + The Dubov System
Davorin Kuljasevic and Vladimir Fedoseev dissect two topical opening lines
Giri-Nepomniachtchi
The winner of the Magnus Carlsen Invitational analyses his Sicilian triumph from the final
Linares 1991 – Strategy
Mihail Marin focusses on games from: Ivanchuk, Kasparov, Beliavsky, Jussupow and Salov
Serve and volley: the Belgrade Gambit
Christian Braun hits with 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.d4 exd4 5.Nd5
Carlsen’s Kamikaze king
Peter Heine Nielsen examines the Carlsen's Dragadorf victory vs. Dominguez Perez from the Opera Euro Rapid
No gap in the Stonewall
Dutch vs. the Reti/English – Victor Moskalenko shows how to deal with White’s setups without d2-d4
Magnus Carlsen Invitational and Opera Euro Rapid
Games analyses by Aniish Giri, Wesley So, Jan Krzysztof Duda, Peter Heine Nielsen et al.
A sacrificial attack to remember!
Robert Ris dissects the spectacular game So-Aronian “Move by Move”
The pawn as universal weapon!
Tactics with Oliver Reeh featuring 30 games with exercises + 4 interactive videos
Save the best for last
50 high-class endgames from the Champions Chess Tour 2021 analysed by no less than the great endgame expert Grandmaster Karsten Müller.
Included is a eye catching two booklet in two languages!
Conclusion: This is must have material!