Today we are sending QUALITY CHESS PUZZLE BOOK to the printer. It will be 352 pages and we are very happy with it. We are also essentially done with BOOST YOUR CHESS 2 and we are also getting there with GM6 – THE SICILIAN DEFENCE (which will be a big book). Not long after comes PLAY THE SCANDINAVIAN and Marin’s final two books on the English.
Lubomir Ftacnik | Grandmaster Repertoire 6 – The Sicilian Defence | JULY |
John Shaw | Quality Chess Puzzle Book | JULY |
Christian Bauer | Play the Scandinavian | AUGUST |
Artur Yusupov | Boost your Chess 2 | AUGUST |
Mihail Marin | Grandmaster Repertoire 4 – The English Opening vol. 2 | August/september |
Mihail Marin | Grandmaster Repertoire 5 – The English Opening vol. 3 | August/september |
Tibor Karolyi | Karpov’s Strategic Wins: Volume 1 – 1961-1985 | September |
Tibor Karolyi | Karpov’s Strategic Wins: Volume 2 – 1986 – 2009 | September |
John Shaw | The King’s Gambit | september/october |
Boris Avrukh | GM Repertoire 8 – The Grunfeld Defence | LATER |
Milos Pavlovic | The Cutting Edge 2 – The Najdorf Sicilian without 6.Bg5 | LATER |
Tiger Hillarp Persson | Middlegame book – TITLE NOT CONFIRMED | LATER |
Mihail Marin | Common Grandmaster Mistakes – and how to avoid them | LATER |
Artur Yusupov | Boost your Chess 3 | LATER |
Vassilios Kotronias | Middlegame book – TITLE NOT CONFIRMED | LATER |
Milos Pavlovic | The Cutting Edge 3 – The Najdorf Sicilian with 6.Bg5 | LATER |
Jacob Aagaard | Grandmaster Repertoire x1 – 1.e4 – Ruy Lopez | NEXT YEAR |
Jacob Aagaard | Grandmaster Repertoire x2 – 1.e4 – Sicilian | NEXT YEAR |
Jacob Aagaard | Grandmaster Repertoire x3 – 1.e4 – French/Caro-Kann | NEXT YEAR |
Jacob Aagaard | Grandmaster Repertoire x4 – 1.e4 other e5s | NEXT YEAR |
Jacob Aagaard | Thinking Inside the Box | NEXT YEAR |
Jacob Aagaard | Train your Chess Intuition | NEXT YEAR |
Wow Jacob, six books? That’s some task you’ve set for yourself. Good luck!
Another Cutting Edge Book on the Open Sicilian is very nice, but what happened to the 2 KID GM Rep. books?
Very nice, cannot wait for GM6. Please notify us when GM6 is sent off to the printer.
What happened to the two volume KID GM rep books?
The KID books will happen.
In 2012? They were in the 2010 catalog but now they have disappeared from your list.
I can’t wait for GM6! I pre-ordered a hard cover back in May! The GM series is EXCELLENT! (of course, you already know that 😉 Keep up the FANTASTIC work!
Again the KID followers are set to be doomed 🙁
No, they were as “under preparation” or something like this in the 2010 list; I never believed they would be ready before 2011. It is a big job after all!
About me and the 6 books. Some of the lines for the 1.e4 I have prepared over the years, of course, and the two books on positional chess will contain stuff I have worked on for the last 15 years. I will finally give my own best games, as well as the training method I have used to make real and quick progress in the understanding of positional chess with students. As you can probably imagine, it is simple; it has to be to be practical.
The exercises have been collected through the last 4-5 years; tested with many players and computers, and reduced to 25% or less of the initial batch. They are for moments where there is only one best move. The principle solving them will be that the once you solve, you move past quickly, the ones you don’t, you think about – as there is something missing in your chess understanding. A strong grandmaster would solve most of them automatically; but it is interesting to see how a 2600 GM I gave 12 of them solved only 10, the last two being exactly the same mistake. He was a bit too proud to pay attention to it, but actually it said a lot about him as a player :-).
By the way, there will be two Cutting Edge books on the Najdorf, one with mainly Be3, but also a few other fashionable things, and one with 6.Bg5
i would suggest a hardback for Karolyi’s books on Karpov. In my opinion his “Endgame Virtuoso” was one of the finest chess books ever, and i have huge expectations from this new one. hope won’t be any other delays, but i know one never knows…
Well the catalog is still online. Here is the list for “Coming 2010/2011”:
The King’s Gambit
Experts on the Anti-Sicilian
GM – The Grünfeld
Cutting Edge – Open Sicilian 2
GM – 1.e4 vol. 1-4
GM – King’s Indian vol. 1-2
Cutting Edge – Slav & Semi-Slav
Boost your Chess 3
Chess Evolution 1-3
all of these except the KID books and the cutting edge slav and semi-slav are on your publishing schedule 🙁
Come on!
Come on guys there is enough KID books out there, you surely can’t be that desperate.
I play The Triangle there are hardly any book on that!!
Excellent hp, respect! As a KID-player I am happy to know, that there’s a KID repertoire coming out. Who will be the author of this repertoire?
Btw, won’t occure there any problems, when the KID – repertoire has to face some variations that are given in Avruchs “1.d4”? It’s the same with the grunfeld defence and the e4 repertoire, which has to “refute” Ftacnik’s “Sicilian Defense”.
How are you going to solve this nasty situation?
Answer: Honestly
@ kilo
It’s a silly question, how QC has to ‘solve’
the so-called ‘nasty situation’ – because it shows a fundamental
misunderstanding in what an opening book can do. Ftacniks book
won’t be the refutation of 1. e4 – if it were, no one would play
1. e4 anymore and the book was useless. Avrukh hasn’t ‘refuted’
the Indian Defences; if had, we could all look for a new game to
be addicted to…
In the main lines, the best thing you can get is a position, which
is slightly better for White; and whats more important, a position you
feel comfortable with. So, Ftacnik will recommend a line, Aagaard will
recommend one against it, but after all, when the opening phase has finished,
we all can only do one thing: play chess.
Is GM3-4 date final? There have been several delays already :S
@werner
You didn’t understand my point of view.
I didn’t mean, that there will be any opening refuted.
The problem is, as you said “Ftacnik will recommend a line, Aagaard will recommend one against it” , because i do not think, that Ftacnik will recommend a line that gives a plus to white, but Aagaard does. So i think it decreases the credebility of the project somewhat , if one grandmaster gives in an position a plus to white and the next one has to give at least an “=” in the same line , as no reader likes a repertoire, where there’s line, which favours the opponent.
@kilo
thats what I meant: The struggle in chess is between Whites
claim of a plus and Blacks claim of equality – in exactly
the same position. Who’s right? The answer has to be given within
GM play (except in those tactical positions where an engine may decide).
So I wanted to stress the point that we shouldn’t take those evaluations
to important.
I like Marins approach, who gives verbal explanations on the advantages White (or
Black) may have, like space, pawns etc. This gives you some hints for using them in
the middle game.
I continue to claim that the way to work with this question is with honesty. Ftacnik comes with his honest view, I will come with mine. I will try to find things he did not find; probably I will succeed, because this is usually the case with ALL books I have ever worked with.
I think it is a bit more tricky with Boris Avrukh – he has to refute himself. If he is lucky, someone has already found an improvement somewhere and he can use that; solving the dilemma.
My general philosophy towards chess is that it is a game. And that it develops. Our knowledge of it is always expanding. The starting position is probbaly a draw, but White can pose Black problems. Black can and should solve them. The goal for White is to always pose new problems, preferably faster than the opponents manage to solve them. For Black it is to solve the problems – often in advance – although this is the really hard bit!
There is no “nasty” situation. There are many positions which are +=/= or unclear which are interesting for both sides.
A few years ago there was a book by Kaufman called “Chess Advantage in Black and White” which included repertoires both for black and white. Obviously, there were positions which had to be interesting independent of which side you were playing.
I missed the Avrukh question day. I would have asked him if there where any openings or types of positions he liked to play from either side and other openings/positions he wants to avoid, and also to try to motivate his answers. My impression is that very strong players (like him) can play any type of position well and they just care about true strength of the position, whereas amateurs can have stronger feelings for types of positions.
I find it interesting that there soon will be two middle game books by swedish players. Tiger is doing one for QC and Johan Hellsten is doing one for Everyman. I have high expectations on both.
Anand once said exactly the opposite – that the type of position was more important than the evaluation for practical results.
Will the Marin volumes be released simultaneously? If so, is there any reason for this?
How many days away are we from seeing the Ftacnik book ?
I hope we will receive the Ftacnik book in the office the 19th or 20th, the shops in Europe + in the US (Chess4Less, USCF and ChessCafe) will have it just a few days later – if they choose to purchase the books.
The Marin books will come out at the same time. The difference in finishing them is about 2 weeks, so it makes more sense in many ways. Mihail wrote the two books as if it was one, it was meant to be, remember, so the material was finished at the same time, a few weeks ago.
They are big books, so it might take a bit of time to finish them, but they should be out in August.
So do we get a table of contents? Please?
Aside from a table of contents, an excerpt of a Naidorf Chapter would be even better. 🙂
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! English vol. 2 & 3 delayed again. /wrists.
Jus ta little question. Are you planning a book on the Kan Sicilian? There is few books on the subject, at the contrary of the Taimanov, and a great book by a great GM would be welcome (perhaps a GM Repertoire?) Idem for the Tartakover (and Lasker, why not?) variation of the Queen’s Gambit.
Maybe we could add The Leningrad Dutch and the Kalashnikov Sicilian also as ideas for future works… 🙂
Thanks by advance for your answers.
P.S.= I just make an order for The Cutting Edge 1 Hardcover. Could you please tell me in how long it should arrive? I live in France not far from Paris. Thanks.
An excerpt will be up today.
Today is kinda over. 😉
Did you send a newsletter that i maybe didn’t get? 🙁
Jesse, I uploaded the PDF – can you please put it up?
Where is the PDF uploaded?
PDF excerpt, “Grandmaster Repertoire 6 – The Sicilian Defence”
@Jacob Aagaard:
Thank you for the excerpt.
I liked the Title of the Chapters but this is a matter of taste. The line against the closed variation was also very nice.
What I didn’t like however was the fact that there was no excerpt of an Open Sicilian Chapter. You said you’d wait for the book to be finished to show some pages of a Najdorf Chapter.
as already asked (sorry to bother again!) I would like a hardback copy for Karolyi’s two books on Karpov.
do you think it will be possible? i have huge expectation from these two volumes…
ooops. sorry, i read now they will be available in hardcover, so prevoius post is pointless. anyway… thanks a lot, Karolyi is one of my favourite authors and Quality one of my favourite editors so… i can’t wait for this!!!
@Jeremy
I feel your pain, Jeremy!
I can’t wait!
The painnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn
@Jeremy
Hang in there! We will soon enough be proud owners of the best chess books by the best chess publishers in town!
Have you ever seen such excellent books!? Volume One is a “keeper,” a real masterpiece!
And I agree with Andrea…those books about Karpov’s games are going to be great, also!! Save up the pennies and let’s play better chess!
We are doing the best we can! Promise!
Great publishing schedule. I was thinking about areas where chess literature is weak, and I realized there are no excellent tactics books for master (and up) level players. All of the current tactics books are aimed at class players. Quality Chess could publish a tactics book with very advanced problems.
Quick question: Do we get an automated e-mail when orders are shipped, i.e. for GM6? I got an shipment notice e-mail for GM7 in June but not for GM2 in April.
Yes, we use the automated system now.
Hi, do you know when, more or less, are you going to receive the GM6?
thnx
I have just received the newsletter. I presume Ftacnik’s and Shaw’s books are ready and out?
at newinchess it is already out
http://www.newinchess.com/Grandmaster_Repertoire_6___The_Sicilian_Defence-p-5035.html
Yes
When will the books GM rep 6 and Gm rep 7 be available on amazon ??
Hi there I was just wondering when GM 6 will be available from Chess Direct because I can’t buy from your site as I have forgot my password, and have not had an e-mail regarding retreving it. Also I have never recieved a newsletter even though I opted to when buying GM 2.
Keep up the good work 🙂
don’t know why you did not get the newsletter – we will put it online monday. I don’t know why you should have to remember a password, I will ask our webmaster. Anyway, Andrew will have the books Wednesday, I figure.
When you get a chance could you take a picture of GM6 for us, just to see how it looks?
I´m very interested in the Scandinavian book. When will we have a PDF extract? Thank you very much.
It will take a few weeks. I had hoped the book would go to the printer this week, but we had a file corruption and might have to redo a few things.
This is somewhat off-topic with regard to the Publishing Schedule, but I had a thought today when reviewing Dembo’s Grunfeld book for Everyman (which I think is quite good):
What do you guys think of the prospect of Boris covering some Grunfeld-like solutions to 1. Nf3 and 1. c4? Yes, it’s a bit off-topic, but no one has done this, and it’s always been one of my concerns with taking up the Grunfeld. It’d certainly add one notch on to the books belt right off the bat.
newest PDF excerpts:
Yusupov’s Boost your chess 2
Quality Chess Puzzle Book by John Shaw
I noticed that websales have been posted, but my Quality Chess account says “Not shipped” for my GM6 order and there was no automated shipping notice–is everything okay with the order or is it just not updated?
I hope my order was not forgotten to be posted like my previous order for GM2 🙂
Dragadorf, I’m looking forward to that book also. I’ve played almost every opening known to man-kind, and it’s clear that I get my best results (like this weekend where I went 5 and 0 with 3 Englishes as White, 2 Scandinavians as Black) with more solid, predominantly “light-square complex” defenses. I used to play the French, but got fed up with all the stupid draws in the Advance and Exchange. The $500 I won this past weekend will help cover my $50 expense for that book once it comes out in hardcover!
TonyRo, I can see where you are coming from. Last book that I’ve seen cover the “Anti-Grunfeld” was a book on the English written back in the 90’s. I don’t recall the author, but Cadogan had a 2-book series, English Opening: Symmetrical and English opening: Classical and Indian (“Classical” then meant 1…e5). I’m assuming you are referring to the line 1.c4 Nf6 2.Nc3 d5 3.cxd5 Nxd5 and White doesn’t play d4 (the “Anti-Grunfeld”). My problem, however, has been making sense of the Grunfeld itself every time I’ve tried to play it. Every time I try to play agressive defenses, like the King’s Indian, Grunfeld, Benoni, Sicilian, Alekhine, Benko, etc., my King get’s it butt chewed off.
Of course, if you look at what books are out by Quality Chess for Black against 1.d4, I’ve had to look elsewhere myself, though Jacob has told me that there is something more positional (i.e. QGD, Slav [Proper, Not Semi-], or Nimzo-/Queen’s-Indian) will be in the works for Black against 1.d4 (I’m guessing probably mid to late 2011 sometime), but that it would be announced in some fashion other than email. But, till then, it’s off to Everyman to take care of my issues with the Nimzo-/Queen’s Indian Defenses, and Gambit for info on the QGD Orthodox.
Actually, nevermind. I just received my copy of GM6. Excellent! I like the 6. Bg5 lines too, especially 6…Nbd7. Well done QC!
I would like to know what you and others think of the physical quality of the book. The paper we wanted to use for Quality Chess Puzzle Book was no longer available, so we went for a new and similar paper for that one. We wanted GM6 to be printed as the other GM Rep books, but the printed screwed up and printed the book with the wrong paper! So, it will not look as the rest of the series, which is a shame, but we still use this paper – but as it is a first, I would like feedback
The paper is smooth and more glossy like the QC middlegame books, which is not a bad thing. It feels less dry than the other Grandmaster Repertoire books if you move your fingers across the pages. This new paper works well anyway, so nothing has really been lost.
Thank you!
I wonder where is the Alterman Gambit guide for Black in the publishing schedule ? unless I blundered. Thanks
It is being written. It will come; don’t worry. It would essentially be under LATER.