CHESSBOOK REVIEWS 
Latest book reviews of 1 July 2004.
BOOKS REVIEWS BY JOHN ELBURG.Wilhelminalaan 33John Elburg
7261 BP RUURLO
The Netherlands.
Chess Books
50 Golden chess games by Tim Harding
2004
http://www.ChessMail.com
272 pages
Price € 25.00
ISBN 0-9538536-7-5
A brand new collection correspondence games from the ChessMail editor and publisher CC SM Tim Harding who is following up with this release his highly rewarded chess book 64 Great Chess Games.
Again Harding has managed to compile a astounding collection correspondence games all pleasant analysed with a large amount of readable text compressed with excellent made analyses.
As in 64 Great Chess games there is from nearly every player a small biographical and a historical introduction to every played game which I certainly would not call a pen picture!
50 Golden chess games is not only larger in size as 64 Great Chess Games with it’s readable B5 format as Harding’s last Red letters book but above all I enjoyed the deeply opening surveys, as for example the one from the famous correspondence game between Alekhine and Zhukovsky of the 16 th Shakmatnoe Obozrenie of 1905.
For many years Alekhine has mislead the chess world with this smashing correspondence game which was not played in 1905 as Alekhine claimed in first volume of his famous book My Best games of the years 1908 – 1923.
Strange enough Alekhine was not so accurate with the name of the black player and called him mistakenly Jukowsky.
Harding explains this all in this game and suggest that Alekhine has perhaps has written the whole game completely from his memory because he had no access to his note books.
Interesting to mention is that this game does not stand up to modern computer scrutiny and Harding has needed around seven pages to cover all the pain thinking analyses.
The ChessMail readers shall recognize a small fourteen games and one endgame in this book but I can insure the reader all these ChessMail annotations have been completely rewritten!
Included throw this book are contributions by grandmasters in correspondence chess as Fritz Baumbach,Hans Berliner,Marc Geenen,Tunc Hamarat,Rud Maliangkay,Olita Rause, Gert Timmerman,Mikhail Umansky and Alik Zilberberg.
Conclusion: A truly collection golden correspondence games!
Find the winning move by Gary Lane
2004
Batsford Ltd London
http://www.Batsford.com
176 pages
Price $ 21.95
ISBN 0-7134-8871-9
Find the winning move is a amusing puzzle book from over the 400 exercises where IM Gery Lane did awful his best to collect a large amount of amassing chess moves.
The material is divided in sixteen different chapters from winning in two moves till the top 30 all enjoyable presented with a small but readable intro from around 100 words.
The material is mainly stripped from latest tournaments but now and than you shall find a classic beauty as from the game De Vere – Lawrence 1869 taken from Bob Jones his book The English Morphy.
Included is a self rating test.
Conclusion: A very enjoyable read on exercises!
Improve your attacking chess by Simon Williams
2004
Gambit Publications Ltd.
http://www.gambitbooks.com
E-mail info@gambitbooks.com
160 pages
Price $ 19.95
ISBN 1-904600-09-3
Improve your attacking chess s a instructive collection of around 250 exercises based on six chapters where the reader can learn the following attacking techniques, Attacking the king caught in the centre, Attacking the castled king, Strike in the centre, Time is everything!, Attacking on opposite sides and expect the unexpected, where all puzzles are arranged in difficulty and pleasantly full explained with a lot of readable text.
One of mine favourite exercises is number 31 where black goes for the poisoned pawn variation of the Latvian Gambit that arises after: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 f5 3.Bc4 fxe4 4.Nxe5 Qg5 5.d4 Qxg2 6.Qh5+ g6 7.Bf7+ Kd8 8.Bxg6 Qxh1+ 9.Ke2 c6 10.Nc3 e3 11.Bxe3 Qxa1 12.Qg5+ Kc7 13.Nf7 Be7 14.Bf4+ Kb6 15.Na4+ Ka6 16.Bd3+ b5 7.Nc5+ Kb6 18.Nd6 Na6? {This moves spoils everything! Good for a draw or maybe even more was the simple 18…Nf6!}Now how can white force checkmate?
Conclusion: A fascinating collection king attacks!
Michail Tal Sein Lebens werk Band2: 1962-1973
2004
ChessGate
http://www.chessgate.com/
E-Mail: info@chessgate.com
418 pages
Price € 27.80
ISBN 3-935748-04-3
In 1998 Jürgen Daniel launched his first volume on Tal with “Sein Lebenswerk Band 1,1949 –1961 Verlag Schach 1998 and now nearly six years later this ambitious publisher managed to release even under a new publisher name this second ambitious written book about one of the most extraordinary chess players of all time.
Band two which does cover the years 1962-1973 does not only cover around 890 complete games but above all it obtains a lot of original material as personal photo’s and analyses from the great master him self.
Going throw this book I counted over 80 excellent analysed games with personal notes from Tal as for example his match games against Gligoric from Belgrade 1968 which are besides the first match game all covered in great depth!
When we compare the analyses from for example Kasparov in his great Predcessors part II As for instance the game Tal – Larsen Bled 1965 than Kasparov wins it in depth specialy with the computer analyses but the original notes from Tal give a complete other atmosphere one with intuitive fearless play.
His credo was to create tension and to seize the initiative! {Genna Sosonko in Russian Silhouettes New in Chess 2001}
Included in this hard cover is a very useful is the players,openings and eco index where you have no problem to search around in this well made heavy weight!
Conclusion: A great tribute to Tal!
Power Chess with pieces by Jan Timman
2004
New in Chess
http://www.newinchess.com
229 pages
Price € 24.95
ISBN 90-5691-123-6
Probably the player Jan Timman does need no introduction this leading Dutch player from the mid-1970s to the mid-1990s was regarded not so long ago as the best “western chess player”.
Even he is no longer a quest in regular super GM events he remains a top class player with a very aggressive style of play.
Timman concentrates in this latest New in Chess publication on all kind of Knight and bishop endings where the author enjoys to cover this all in complete games and in this case a careful selection of 28 top level events all covered in an understandable –depth look coverage.
For instance if we take a brief look at game 20 Leko – Topalov,Dortmund 2002 that started with the so called four knights variation of the Sicilian defence: 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 Nc6 6.Nxc6 and throw a complex but instructive discussed middle game we reach at last a logical step by step explained bishop & pawn endgame where the reader
is invited to study the endgame technique from strong bishops and weak pawns. The whole game is covered with seven detailed pages where the reader shall find more instructive text than pain thinking analyses.
Besides some classic games as Andersson – Browne Wijk aan Zee 1983, Karpov – Kasparov Moscow 1984, Romanishin – Timman Taxco 1985 and Kasparov – Karpov Leningrad 1986 are all remaining games in this book from recent tournament practice.
The material has been originally printed in the Dutch language under the title “Schaken met Jan Timman De kracht van het Paard (2002} & De macht van het Loperpaar {2003}.
Usually endgame books are only covered with a endgame position but here we have a unique chance to study all the moves of the game!
Conclusion: A very didactic written chess book!
The Colle Koltanowski system by Valeri Bronznik
2004
Schachverlag Kania
Richard Wagner str.43 71701 Schwieberdingen Duitsland.
E-mail Keilhack@aol.com
http://www.kaniaverlag.de
Pages 223
Price Euro 19.80
ISBN 3-931192-25-3
In September 2003 we reviewed the German edition of the Colle Koltanowski system from Valerij Bronznik but now the German chess publisher Kania Verlag has made a perfect written English translation from this highly interesting opening that once belonged to the pet lines of the great George Koltanowski (1903-2000}.
Koltanowski brought the opening to the attention of the chess world by playing it against the strongest players of his day which even included a drawn game against Alekhine.
Bronznik concentrates in this book on a lot of latest examples {As Ree – Timman,Amsterdam 2000} but now and than he prefers to cover some highly instructive classic examples as for instance Colle – O’Hanlon Nice 1930 & Koltanowski,Comtal 1934.
Conclusion: A very interesting work to learn and understand the Colle system!
Fischer,Kasparov and he others by Don Schultz
The best of ChessDon and much more
2004
http://www.chessdon.com
E-mail chessdon@aol.com
240 pages
Price $ 12.95
ISBN 0-9670775-1-6
This book from the former president of the Unites States Chess Federation Donald D.Schultz was originally intended to be a second edition of Schultz first book ChessDon from 1999.
Again Schultz has managed to create a non chess book with a lot of back ground information seen his personal meetings with famous chess players as Fischer and Kasparov it is no surprise that he has something to tell.
Nearly unknown is that Schultz once has belonged to be part of Fischer’s 1972 World championship team and well as third secondant.
Schultz writes it down with the following notes: Fischer’s three seconds where Fred Cramer,former World Junior Champion Bill Lombardy,and now me.
And do you know who was France’s first Grandmaster? The answer is two time world champion candidate Pal Benko.
Pal was born in France while his Hungarian parents were on vacation there.
Conclusion: Don Schultz s no story teller but his book is certainly worth reading.
Chess CD's
Sicilian Dragon 2B75 – B79 by Dorian Rogozenko
2004
ChessBase http://www.chessbase.com
E-Mail info@chessbase.com
Price € 29.99
System requirements Pentium 166,32 MB RAM, Windows98,Windows ME,Windows2000,and Windows XP.
ChessBase Reader included!
This latest CD-ROM deals with the exciting the Rauzer (or Yugoslav) Attack, an ambitious system, which starts with 6.Be3 and where the white king castles long, see B75 - 6.Be3 Bg7 7.f3 (7...0-0; 7...Nc6).
As the Sveshnikov CD GM Dorian Rogozenko enjoys covering compressive database surveys as in the master base there are around 600 annotated game and text files from Rogozenko!
Where the master has a total from 26274 games where over the 1000 games carry excellent annotations.
But first a example of Rogozenko annotations:
Macieja,B (2653) - Shabalov,A (2623) [B75]
Bermuda Bermuda (10), 25.01.2004
[Rogozenko]
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nc3 g6 4.d4 cxd4 5.Nxd4 Bg7 6.Be3 d6 7.Qd2 Nf6 8.f3 h5?! This ultra-modern approach is nowadays occasionally seen in other Sicilians (for instance in some lines of Najdorf Variation). Nevertheless, in Dragon such things can hardly succeed. The explanation is that in Dragon Variation White's control in the center is event better than in other Sicilians. He will arrange rooks on d1 and e1 and will have a strong pressure on the central files. Unlike in other Sicilians, here Black usually cannot remove the pawn from e7, since that would create visible weaknesses on the d-file (of course, there are exceptions). As a result, White has always better control over square d5 (and d4!). So in order to neutralize White's central pressure, Black should create counterplay on the queenside. When White develops harmoniously his pieces in the center (castle long, Bc4-b3, Rhe1), it's not easy at all for Black to succeed in creating his queenside counterplay. And without connecting his rooks, Black has practically no chances. Thus any queenside actions with black king in the center will fail. At some moment Black would have to castle short anyway. In that case, the pawn on h5 is justified only with white pawn on h4. Otherwise White always keeps the option to start a kingside attack by playing h3 and g4, like in our case.
Concluding all mentioned above, after the move 8...h5 Black might always have problems with the king (in the center he is much worse, queenside actions will not succeed and the kingside is very vulnerable).
White's plan is to develop pieces in the center and keep the option to play h3 and g4. The present game is a model one in that respect. 9.0-0-0 [ A different, but also effective approach was demonstrated in the following game: 9.Bc4 Bd7 10.Bb3 Na5 11.0-0 Basically, here White intends to play only in the center. Black king can be relatively safe on the kingside, but the move h5 is pretty ugly anyway. Any central strategy from White will have bigger impact on Black's position For instance he has square g5 in his possession, the advance of f-pawn will be extremely unpleasant for Black. Finally, accidents like in the game are also a logical consequence of ...h5. 11...Rc8 12.Nd5 Nxd5 13.exd5 Qc7 ( 13...0-0 14.f4!?± ( 14.Rae1; 14.Kh1±) ; 14.Qd3 Nc4? 15.Ne6! Very nice. Black is punished for his careless strategy. 15...fxe6 16.dxe6 Bxe6 17.Qxg6+ Kd7 18.Qxg7 Rhg8 19.Qd4 a6 20.Rf2+- h4 21.Qxh4 1-0 Becerra Rivero,J-Shabalov,A/Virginia Beach 2003] 9...Bd7 10.Bc4 [ 10.Kb1 Rb8 ( 10...a6 11.Nd5 why hurry with this move? ( 11.h3) 11...0-0 12.Nxf6+ Bxf6 13.h4?! ( ¹13.Nb3) 13...Qb6 14.c3 Qa5 15.Nb3 Qa4 Zhang Pengxiang-Shabalov,A/Shanghai 2002. Here White failed in his opening strategy. Black is well developed (in opposite to his opponent), the rooks are connected and White's quick attack with g2-g4 involve some material sacrifices. Difficult to say whether White is worse, but he deefinitely could have done better than this.; 11.h3 a6 12.Qf2 Qc8 13.Be2 b5 14.g4 b4 15.Nd5 Nxd5 16.exd5 Na5 17.Rhe1 Bf6 18.Bf4 Kf8 19.Qe3± White has a big strategical advantage, which he converted into a full point, Filipenko,A-Motylev,A/Ekaterinburg 1996.] 10...Rc8 11.Bb3 a6 [ 11...Na5 12.Kb1 Nc4 ( 12...a6 13.h3 h4 14.Rhe1 Rh5 15.Nde2 Nc4 16.Bxc4 Rxc4 17.b3 Rc8 18.Nf4 Re5 19.Nfd5 Nxd5 20.Nxd5 Be6 21.Nf4 Qd7 22.Bd4 Qc6 23.Nd3 f6 24.Nxe5 dxe5 25.Bb2 b5 26.Re2 Kf7 27.Qe1 Ra8 28.Red2 g5 29.Rd8 Ra7 30.R1d3 a5 31.Qe3 Qa6 32.Rb8 a4 33.Rb6 Qa5 34.Bc3 1-0 Khalifman,A-Shabalov,A/Moscow 2001/CBM 86 (34)) 13.Bxc4 Rxc4 14.Rhe1 0-0 15.Nb3 ( 15.h3!?) 15...Qc7 16.Bh6 ( 16.h3!?) 16...Bxh6 17.Qxh6 Rc8 18.Qg5 a6 19.e5 dxe5 20.Rxe5 Bf5 21.Rxf5 Nh7 22.Qe3 Rxc3 ( 22...gxf5 23.Nd5) 23.Qxc3 gxf5 24.Qd3² ½-½ Naumann,A-Shabalov,A/Bad Wiessee 2002 (45)] 12.Rhe1 0-0 13.Kb1 Re8 14.h3 Big problems for Black. 14...Qa5 [ 14...h4 15.Nxc6± ( 15.Qf2!?) ] 15.g4 Ne5?! This is bad, but on the other hand is difficult to advise any sensible plan. 16.Bh6± Bh8 17.f4 Nc4 18.Bxc4 Rxc4 19.Nb3+- Simple and nice. A total failure of Black's opening strategy. 19...Qd8 20.e5 Nxg4 21.hxg4 Bxg4 22.exd6 Kh7 23.Bg5 f6 24.Qd5 Rxc3 25.Qf7+ Bg7 26.Bxf6 1-0
Included are besides the Openings tree two testing files from around 70 positions simple to test your Dragon skills.
Conclusion: A very extensive made openings CD!
Fritz trainer middlegame by Peter Wells
2004
ChessBase http://www.chessbase.com
E-Mail info@chessbase.com
Price € 24.99
System requirements: PC 233,64 MB RAM,CD-ROM drive,sound card,mouse,Windows XP,2000,ME,98,Windows Media player 9.
A very interesting chess multimedia course from GM Peter Wells based on 667 MB Fritz 8 Chess multimedia system which is based on a kind of Windows media file but than brightly integrated in Fritz 8 with full video pictures and synchronised chess graphics,where the user shall find extra moves, diagrams and spoken video files from GM Peter Wells.
Very handy is to start your favourite chess engine before you open your chess media file this way you can easy check the analysis from the author and sometimes are the evaluations from the chess engine are really disappointing!
The whole course from Wells is well made and contains the following chapters, Introduction, Calulation, Commitment and defence, Zwischenzug, Anatomy of Blunders I, Anatomy of Blunders II, Positional Pawn sacrifice, Positional pawn, Sacrifice II, Bad pieces I, Bad Pieces II and Blockade.
The chapter calculation is nearly 30 minutes and the remaining ones are around 20 minutes each where
the whole combination of seeing Wells explaining this is all in front of even it is in a small window is super instructive and if you simple take some time to study the whole course you certainly will develop a better understanding of the middle game in chess.
For instance in chapter 10 {Blockade} is instructive covered with two blockade games as Van Wely – Leko,Wijk aan Zee 2001,a so called less successful blockade and a famous snapshot moment between Tal against Lin, Manilla 1990.
To get it all running you running on your computer you need Windows Media player 9 {Standard in Windows XP}otherwise it will not run!
Conclusion: A instructive combination of spoken video pictures and synchronised chess graphics!
Catalan E00-E09 by Mihail Marin
2004
ChessBase http://www.chessbase.com
E-Mail info@chessbase.com
Price € 29.99
System requirements Pentium 166,32 MB RAM, Windows98,Windows ME,Windows2000,and Windows XP.
ChessBase Reader included!
The Catalan 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.g3 is covered on this CD with a hugh collection of 27756 games where a small 1438 games cover annotations where a small 538 of them come from the successful Romanian chess champion who just has made a jump above the magic 2600 rating barrier.
Himself. The remaining annotations come mainly from the well known ChessBase magazines.
The 62 text files are more than enough for a first understanding and more of this opening which ones belonged to the pet lines of the great Alekhine.
The Dutch Gennadi Sosonko is a living legend on the Catalan and is well covered on this CD with a impressive collection of 151 games.
Included besides the training database is a an excellent made opening tree.
Conclusion: Well filled.
ChessBase Corr Database 2004
ChessBase http://www.chessbase.com
E-Mail info@chessbase.com
Price € 79.90
System requirements: Pentium PC,Win 98,ME,2000,XP,32 MB RAM,CD-ROM,ChessBase 8.0.
The latest ChessBase correspondence database with around 503255 games where a small 1941 of them carry annotations.
Also included is a correspondence chess player base from around 60.000 games where you can find the ICCF ratings and eventual chess titles that these correpondence chess players have achieved.
I would like to mention that there is in the http://www.iccf.com side a free available eloquery that even offers more possibilities as tournament references,history information etc than this 5.76 MB ChessBase encyclopaedia file.
When we compare this with the 2002 Corr ChessBase database than they made quite a improvement but when we compare it all with Harding’s Mega 3 CD from 2003 with it’s 527810 games and where over the 17000 games are annotated than it is clear that ChessBase has still a far way to go.
The references to the games stay weak and when I search for example on Alekhine his correspondence games than Harding’s Mega CD gives around 91 Alekhine games and the ChessBase 2004 comes with a small 79 of them where strangely enough ChessBase give a famous simultaneous game from Alekhine against Rodzinski as ICCF correspondence game from the year 1987!
This game is perfect mention in the ChessBase monograph CD from Robert Hubner but someway ChessBase has problems filtering out these mistakes.
Conclusion: A large correspondence database but unfortunately with some mistakes!
Chess Magazines
British Chess Magazine No.5
Volume 124
June 2004
Price: £3.25
Starting with 4NCL Early may weekend, all ready the fourth weekend of the British team championship where Alexandra Kosteniuk made her 4NCL debut. She scored 2.5 out 3!
{There is a fine 14 page coverage.}Furness on chess, Russian team championship {With a fine analysed game of Morozevich – Bologan with the 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.f3 }5th Karpov International, Coventry International {With some analysed games from Colin Crouch}Remembering Barry Wood (1909 – 1989} by Bernard Cafferty {B.H. Wood was one of the most influential figures in British chess of the 20th century}Games department, Book Reviews etc.
Conclusion: A high quality chess magazine!
ChessMail issue 4/2004
http://www.chessmail.com
E-mail editor@chessmail.com
Chess Mail Limited, 26 Coolamber Park
Dublin 16 Ireland
Basic Subscription 42 Euros.
{For eight issues.}
The most interesting articles in this well filled ChessMail issue are : Tournament news a excellent fourteen page coverage of the latest world Championship correspondence chess and some interesting side lines as Arno Nickel’s strange computer match!
Pleasant to mention is Harding’s interesting theory survey covering the so feared Sveshnikov where Harding concentrates on the pseudo sacrifice with 1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 e5 6. Ndb5 d6 7. Bg5 a6 8.Na3 b5 9. Bxf6 gxf6 10. Nd5 f5 11. Bd3 Be6 12. O-O Bxd5 13. exd5 Ne7 14. Nxb5 {Five pages!}
Others are The forgotten CC Olympiad by Tim Harding, Gameknot wins friendly server match over CCLA, CC Olympiad II : the winners’view,Olympiad II Final: tables & games,
First result already in Rochade event, ICCF tournament results service, Book reviews etc!
Conclusion: Buy it for the Sveshnikov article !