Killer Opening Repertoire Reviewed

Today I received a newsletter from Chessville informing me that Bill McGeary has reviewed "A Killer Chess Opening Repertoire":

The review is in general favourable and contains no big surprises. In my opinion the reviewer somewhat misses the mark when he writes:
"Another thing is that the book is dated. Certainly the material in this book is very good, but a number of the lines have evolved a great deal since the first edition. Johnsen writes that only six new games appear in this edition and only one was taken out, also that some games were expanded."
My objection is that the main updating went into the notes and not into the games selection. Sean Marsh' review in Marsh Towers comes closer to my point of view: "Opening the book at random, I discovered an average of five post-1998 game references per double-page spread. Despite the outward appearance, showing (at first glance) the book to be more or less the same as the old edition, it is clear that Sverre has put a lot of work into creating this new edition, while keeping his footsteps very discrete."


Anyway, the review is mostly positive and for those too busy to look up and read the entire review, I quote McGeary's concluding words:
"I like this book a lot and would recommend it to players in the 1700-2100 range. At club level the material will be a heavy winner and in local tournaments nearly as potent. The most valuable aspect for readers of the book is seeing how the opening flows together as the piece arrangements work with the selected pawn structures. A perfect book for improving players in the rating range I mentioned."


These words certainly were true for the original edition and I hope I have contributed to the book's longevity.

Killer Repertoire in French

I must admit I was surprised today to discover that "A Killer Chess Opening Repertoire" has been translated to French.

The new title is "Répertoire d'ouvertures efficace" which I assume must mean "An Efficient Opening Repertoire". The subtitle "pour joueur d'échecs paresseux" I think must mean "for lazy chessplayers". A little less bloodthirsty than the original English title.

As you can see, also the cover is a little less aggressive. I prefer Wolff Morrow's artwork, but the French one is quite nice too, in a very different way. Can anyone tell me the name of the artist (I assume his signature can be seen below the drawing, but I am unable to read it)?

I am proud to now have been translated to two major European languages, and hope Gambit Publishing or the French publisher Olibris will be kind enough to send me a few copies.

Update July 21st
I found this advertisment which includes a review. My French is quite poor but I will try to translate the conclusion:

Autre atout de l'ouvrage, le choix des parties illustratives, jouées par des joueurs qui ne sont pas des grands-maîtres. Une autre bonne idée car c'est bien ce qui se passe pour la majorité des tournois d'échecs pour nous autres amateurs. Avouons-le tout bonnement, c'est une idée géniale !


Another asset of  the work is the choice of illustrative games, played by players who are not Grandmasters. This is a good idea because for us amateurs this is what occurs in the majority of chess tournaments. Let us acknowledge that this simply is a brilliant idea!

Well, I hope that isn't too inaccurate. Please inform me if you can improve the translation. Anyway, "Chess & Strategy" appears to also be a chess vendor, so the 'review' cannot be expected to be very critical and I will not read too much into it.

Donaldson's Review of A Killer Chess Opening Repertoire

Yesterday I noticed that John Donaldson's review quoted at Gambit's info page is now available in Northwest Chess Magazine. Is it a coincidence that there now is a reader's review of 'A Killer Chess Opening Repertoire' by 'Northwest' at Amazon.com?

The magazine seems to be a nice product with a pleasant blend of games, analysis and local tournament information. It's not 100% clear to me exactly which area the magazine covers but it seems to be produced in Seattle, US.

Unexpectedly I am having another busy week. I expect to be blogging more frequently the next couple of months.

Update July 5th
Now the review is also available at Silman's Chess Reviews. The review is identical but I believe the readership is far greater.

Chess Cafe Reviews the Killer Repertoire

In his influential monthly chess book column - Checkpoint, Carsten Hansen yesterday reviewed (among others) "A Killer Chess Opening Repertoire" under the heading 'Happy Days for Queen's Pawn Enthusiasts'. Generally his review is favourable and his conclusion is:

'However, the meat of the book is on the Colle and Colle-related set-ups, and in those chapters the book really proves its worth. Overall, it is an easily approachable book; the repertoire is by and large not too difficult to follow, even if some of the surprise value has been eliminated by the original book being on the market for more than ten years. In many ways, this present work is a considerable upgrade over the original, and, even by today's high standards for opening books, it is a very good book. It can be enjoyed by players rated up to around 2000.'

He awards the book with three stars (out of a maximum of four). I obviously would have liked one more star but cannot really complain. According to the Rating Chart three stars is 'good' and four stars 'excellent'. So when Hansen says it is 'very good' I will assume the extra star was within shooting range.

I don't really agree that the chapters on the Colle (Zukertort) are the core of the book. As I see it, the book's starting point is the Barry Attack (1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.Nc3 d5 4.Bf4). With this as a basis it adds other low-theory systems - including some Colle related systems - in order to supply the reader with a complete 1.d4 repertoire. However, this is mainly a question of perspectives and in support of Hansen's view it must be admitted that Colle-related systems take up at least 68 of the book's 192 pages.

I note with interest that Hansen recommends the book for players up to 2000. In his 'Introduction to the First Edition' from 1998, Summerscale writes: 'This book is aimed primarily at club-level players with a playing strength of up to about 2200 Elo (or 200 BCF)'. I briefly considered commenting upon this when writing my 'Updater's Notes' as I had a feeling that today's 2200 players generally prepare a bit deeper than they did a decade ago. When I after all decided not to comment on Summerscale's original estimate, it was because I felt that in general the added material compensated for theory's development.

What I really don't understand is this remark:

'There are even some bizarre recommendations towards the end of the book, such as how White is to meet 1 d4 d6, where the book recommends 2 e4, which allows Black to take the game to a Pirc or Modern Defense or even the Philidor after 2..Nf6 3 Nc3 e5 4 Nf3. I can't see too many club players, who employ the Colle as white, also going for 2 e4, which changes the entire nature of the game.'

This is a bit mysterious as 2.e4 clearly isn't a bizarre move in itself. It leads to a positions of a different nature than the Colle but so do many other of the books proposed lines. Hansen's point must be that allowing a transposition to the Pirc, Modern and Philidor doesn't fit well with the rest of the book's proposed repertoire. This criticism would make sense if there wasn't a full chapter in the book on the 150-Attack against the Pirc and Modern.

Summerscale's original work didn't mention 1...d6, and I must admit that I too originally missed this gap in the repertoire. So when Gambit's editorial staff pointed this out and suggested  2.d4 and a condensed repertoire to cover the non-Pirc lines, I was happy to accept their suggestion. The only sensible alternative seemed to be 2.Nf3, when 2...Bg4!? would require some analysis as well as some prose discussing the strategic points of Black's ...Bxf3 option. In addition there also was 2...f5!? which didn't quite fit into the proposed repertoire against the Dutch.

 

So in my opinion the only bizarre aspect of 1.d4 d6 2.e4 is the book's attempt to offer a repertoire against the Czech and the New Philidor in half a column. This clearly isn't sufficient to be well prepared in the professional sense of the word. But for the sub-2200 readers it doesn't seem too bad. 1...d6 is after all only Black's 6th most popular move and will normally lead to the Pirc. The Czech (3...c6) seems to be out of fashion (I think there are theoretical problems in the 4.f4 lines) and not that hard to face unprepared anyway. That leaves the Philidor which is an interesting opening where Black has good prospects to outplay a weaker player in the middlegame. However, it's mainly Black that has to be careful in order to survive the first 15 moves.

When re-reading the text on Black's non-Pirc options I notice one unfortunate omission. After 1.d4 d6 2.e4 Nf6 3.Nc3 e5 4.Nf3, Black may try the Antoshin variation 4...exd4 5.Nxd4 Be7, which isn't mentioned at all. However, this too is a very quiet option where White scores well above average, so if a reader should happen to meet it and lose the game, I would expect him to blame his own middlegame play rather than the book.

German Review of the Killer Repertoire

Yesterday I stumbled over a very interesting German language blog 'Schachtraining' (yes, it means chess training) with a brief review of 'A Killer Chess Opening Repertoire'. If you read some German, you could do worse than following this apparently frequently updated chess blog.

For those not reading German, here is an attempt to translate the summary:

"Die meisten der vorgestellten Systeme können ohne großen Aufwand erlernt werden und erfordern nur geringe Variantenkenntnisse. Selbstredend dürfte dadurch sein, dass der Spieler demzufolge keine großen Stellungsvorteile erhoffen darf , aber die Solidität sichert ihm zumeist ausgeglichenes Spiel. Ein Repertoire für Praktiker auf Vereinsniveau. Wer im Besitz der Erstausgabe ist und die Systeme im Repertoire hat, wird voraussichtlich mehr von spezialisierter Literatur profitieren, anstatt das Update zu erwerben."

"Most of the systems presented can be adopted quite easily and demand only modest knowledge of exact variations. This may be due to the systems offering no sizable opening advantage but their solidity will at least ensure you equal play. A repertoire for practical players at club level. Presumably, if you already have the first edition and have adopted the repertoire you will profit more from specialist literature than from getting this update."

(My German is to a large extent based on the language's similarity with Norwegian and contains an element of guesswork. So any improvements/corrections will be appreciated.)

I don't quite agree with this conclusion and may add some comments at a later point.

Killer Repertoire in Marsh Towers

In his chess reviews today, Sean March among other reviews "A Killer Chess Opening Repertoire". The potential buyer can also find a snapshop from one of the new games I added and his impressions regarding the extent of the update. I don't think his estimate of 5 new game references on a double spread is far off but I know that the changes are far from uniformly distributed.

Marsh has certain doubts about some of the repertoire choices but seems quite satisfied with the update and concludes:
"This is a neat little book which can provide serious ammunition for keen club players."

Elburg reviews "A Killer Chess Opening Repertoire"

Only this Monday afternoon I got hold of some copies of the revised "A Killer Chess Opening Repertoire". Since then I have been very busy and haven't really had the time to examine the book closely. My first impression is that most (possibly all) of my late corrections/additions made it to the final varsion.

Today I found the first review of the book at John Elburg's chess reviews. As expected he is quite positive. My guess is that Gambit on their info page will only quote his concluding line:
Conclusion: Impressive update!

Elburg points out that there is no bibliography and thinks this would have been useful for the reader. Well, he may be right. However, as a matter of fact I originally wrote a quite extensive bibliography but eventually decided to skip it as it would either have been somewhat misleading or would have needed a lot of comments. For instance it would have been somewhat misleading to list the large number of books that I consulted only to find out that they had nothing new to offer.

Elburg also mentions my analysis on Trygstad’s 1.d4 f5 2.Bg5 h6 3.Bh4 g5 4.e4 Rh7!? which may be the part where I did the most analytical work (or more precisely: where I had Rybka slaving for the longest time).

As a matter of fact only a tiny fraction of my analysis was actually included in the book. Initially I spent a lot of time trying to find a way to a clear advantages in the semi endgames resulting from Williams' mainlines in Dangerous Weapons: The Dutch. However, although I succeeded finding some quite promising paths, the positions remained difficult and there was a very real risk that Black would be better prepared for these positions. There were also space issues to be taken into consideration (the book's 192 A5 pages have been utilized more fully than I have ever seen in a chess opening manual). So in the end - just before the final proofs had to be sent - I retraced a few steps, searched for moves that Williams had ignored, and was happy to find a quite promising option that could be covered within the space available. Now I look forward to analytical feedback from Dutch players.

Killer Chess Opening Repertoire Available

According to Gambit Publishing's Infopages, 'A Killer Chess Opening Repertoire' is now available. I don't know why Gambit now has the copyrights to the book (the previous edition was an Cadogan/Everyman book). Although I am listed as a co-author I really was more of an editor as my instruction from Gambit was to leave the original content unchanged wherever reasonable. Summerscale was not involved in the update; I don't know why and presume he must be busy with other matters.

What I did was mainly adding recent game references and analysis wherever appropriate. However, this in turned forced a considerable restructuring of the book, as some of the notes were already overly long. I believe this was a fortunate necessity as it made the book a more comfortable read. Now the book is 192 A5 pages - an increase of 48 pages or roughly a third of the original 1998 version. I didn't do a lot of independent analysis but I did spend a lot of hours together with Rybka on a few critical lines.

Now I am quite eager to get my hands on a copy - not least because of the cover artwork which looks great from the web images. Unfortunately, I fear my copies will take some time to arrive as deliveries to Norway have taken surprisingly long time lately.

Note
This entry was updated on April 8th, 2010. My apologies for making at least one of the comments below looking a little strange.