Its a fun book, lots of Czech Benoni-specific ideas/tactics/stratagems I knew nothing about. Contrary to some reviews it has quite a few games not played by Hoffmann.

One game per page, each game with an Introduction and brief notes. (The Intros are usually longer than the annotations…) The book is paperback, 138 pages with short Introduction and an Index of Players. Also a Kindle version if you are so inclined. Me, I like real books. Hardcopy media is going the way of the Dodo – just one more step in the long-term drive to erase history.

These are all amateur games, mostly Mr. Sawyer as the protagonist occasionally other players’ games.

There are a couple of interesting ideas in the book and a few chessic anecdotes. I would position it in the same space as the book on the Colle, The Dogs of War. If you ‘Gotta have ‘em all’ at least this modest tome is inexpensive.

The best book on Bird’s is still R.E. Robinson’s 1. P-KB4: A Guide to Bird’s Opening (1948, 1950) which is getting some tough to find, especially with dust jacket. Short of that I would recommend Lakdawala’s Bird’s Opening: Move by Move, Schwarz and Taylor to the fledgling Bird buff.

Danielson - The Polar Bear System (1, 2) - Kindle

Deppe – From’s Gambit

Hodgson - Trends in the Bird's Opening

Lakdawala – Bird’s Opening: Move by Move

Lonsdale - The Strum Gambit

Lonsdale - Wagner-Zwitersch Defense

O'Connell - Bird's Opening

Picket - A Modern Approach to Bird's Opening

Robinson - 1. P-KB4 (A Guide to Bird's Opening)

Sawyer – Bird & Dutch

Schiller - How to Play the From's Gambit

Schwarz – Bird Eroffnung

Soltis - Bird's Opening

Soltis - Winning with the 1. f4

Soltis: Bird-Larsen Attack

Taimanov – Hollandisch bis Bird ‘bis’ v10

Taylor - Bird's Opening

I’ve enjoyed all of Moskalenko’s books – The Wonderful Winawer, The Flexible French, The Diamond Dutch, The Perfect Pirc-Modern and Revolutionize Your Chess. Apparently The Flexible French (2008) was received well enough to justify a follow-up volume.

I’ve played the French on-and-off over the years with decent results and somewhat have a love-hate relationship with it. On RedHotPawn I was 6-4-2 with it. Still, unlike <Shams> I am not a ‘breed apart’although I have 120 or so French tomes.

The Even More Flexible French is very well laid out and – unlike many modern opening books – it is fairly easy to follow the analysis all the way down to sub-sub variations. There are breakout boxes for ‘Tricks’ and quite a few small photographs sprinkled throughout, making things entertaining and easier on the eyes.

Sections have short but useful introductions and brief ending summaries. Each game also has an introduction and summary.

The sections in TEMFF: Advance Variation, Tarrasch, Classical System, Winawer and Surprise Weapons for Dynamic Players. Perhaps my favorite one is the Winawer which covers (again) the Portisch-Hook Variation with …Qa5 and …Qa4. Hook seemed to equalize fairly easily against Fischer with this line (only to lose in the complications) and it appears to be having something of a renaissance along with the French itself.

Fischer vs W Hook, 1970

I Saric vs I Kovalenko, 2016

The books covers just about everything, although I wouldn’t call it a repertoire tome.

There is decent coverage of the MacCutcheon which I also like to play. I always remember this game from Informator 2 - Glauser-Keller, Lugano 1966 - 1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. Bg5 Bb4 5. e5 h6 6. Bd2 Bxc3 7. bxc3 Ne4 8. Qg4 Kf8 9. h4 c5 10. Rh3 cxd4 11. cxd4 Qb6 12. Nf3 Nc6 13. Bd3 Nxe5 14. dxe5 Qxf2+ 15. Kd1 Qxd2+ 16. Nxd2 Nf2+ 0-1.

Late last year I purchased several new chess books and just recently got around to looking at them.

One I bought - The Classical French: Move by Move, Lakdawala (Everyman 2014). I generally like the MbyM books, although I think the 'move by move' is an artificial contrivance and mostly a gimmick for the purpose of generating a large series of books for suckers such as myself. I have also enjoyed Lakdawala's previous efforts.

To my great surprise, The Classical French does NOT cover the Classical French! Unless I missed a turn, I have always known the CF as 1. e4, e6; 2. d4, d5; 3. Nc3, Nf6; 4. Bg5, Be7.

There is nada on that line in this 'Classical French' book, instead stopping at the Steinitz then skipping the Classical and going straight to the Mac.

http://twchesssafari.blogspot.com/2... (#5)

Not all the books in the series concerned chess - a rather eccentric series it seems to me.

For those who want to read ChessSafari's series from the beginning:

http://twchesssafari.blogspot.com/2... (#1-3)

http://twchesssafari.blogspot.com/2... (#4)

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Z5Y9G7XmN...

...and there's a few good titles clearly visible (an important feature for this type of photo).

FWIW- The photos aren't my (limited) collection. They're just random shots which I found on the net and thought fairly good.

Here's another, the Faber editions suggest a British collector

http://www.kingpinchess.net/wp-cont...

It's funny, but I think chess players have a special fondness for their books, maybe beyond other "hobbyists".

Do you have a google account?

(The other technique is to leave your email in a comment on the blog - it's moderated, so I delete without publishing it. Then I shoot a reply, etc...)

BTW- If the Ault book is on Amazon, they allow user uploads of cover art.

http://www.chesslund.com/detail.asp...

A third English language volume on the games of Leonid Stein has been released in the Move-By-Move series.

Stein Move By Move, IM Thomas Engquvist, Everyman 2016 joins Keene's Leonid Stein: Master of Attack and the translation of Gufeld's Leonid Stein: Master of Risk Strategy. Gufeld's work is an update of a Russian 'Black Series' book on Stein. Stein's games are also featured in Chess Secrets: Great attackers.

There is a nice bio of the GM, including new (at least to me) details on the circumstances of Stein's untimely demise. There has been much speculation thereof; see the CG.com forum on Leonid Stein for more.

Engqvist does a decent job with the annotations (30 games as White, 30 games as Black) although I don't think he devotes enough effort to Stein's unique style of attacking-dynamic-hypermodern.

If you are into his games, the book is obviously a must-have. If not; not so much.

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon...

* * * * *

<(It would be nice if CG.com could someday update their Notepad text with basic Word formatting capabilities...)>

http://www.ebay.com/itm/110-of-110-...

Hardly a bargain, but probably tough to get some of the early volumes nowadays. And of course the time chasing them all down.

I was just getting into chess when Informant #1 arrived. Still have it...

<consequtive> boy, oh boy, somebody needs an editor.

Anyways, I might peek in on that sale and see if the buyer gets his asking price.

"Contender for gaudiest cover"

I have that book and I agree, it's very bright.

I have been having fun with some famous covers, this kind of thing...

http://www.redhotpawn.com/chess-blo...

Be good if you/anyone could rec a cover that I can gif-up.

The first picture here should be on chess cover.