Tuesday, June 29, 2010

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.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Northwest Chess is the official monthly publication of the Washington and Oregon Chess Federations.

Anonymous said...

Thanks a lot for your efforts on this fantastic book:I'm just an improver but I've really appreciated your results. Maybe you could suggest an "expansion" to the repertoire in the book: an opening, I mean, that could be used at times as a "surprise weapon", based on similar ideas, if it's possible.
Francesco from Italy ( sorry for my English )

Sverre Johnsen said...

Francesco,

I am glad to know that you liked my update of the Killer Repertoire.

However, there may indeed be a language problem as I am not entirely sure what kind of expansion you are suggesting.

The book itself will probably not be updated for another decade. It would clearly be possible to write a supplementary book/booklet with some alternative surprise lines. For instance you could add the Tarzan attack against the King's Indian/ Gruenfeldt Defence and maybe something unorthodox but relatively safe against the Dutch. This might well be a good idea for a new book but my impression is that a "complete repertoire" would sell better.

However, the obvious way forward from the Killer Repertoire would be to upgrade it by adding main lines one by one. Personally, my first priority would be to learn enough Tarrasch theory to confidently meet 1.d4 d5 2.Nf3 c5 with 3.c4. Next I would maybe add some more Queen's Gambit lines with 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 d5 3.c4 (but keep 3.e3 as a useful back-up option), and so on.

Anonymous said...

Thanks a lot for your response. I was not asking for a new book or booklet but simply for an opening to surprise someone expecting my abitual repertoire. I think I will try the Polish, even if I think the ideas are quite different
Francesco

Sverre Johnsen said...

Francesco,

The name "Polish" is usually used about the lines 1.d4 b5 and 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 b5, which are lines for Black. And, indeed a quite interesting question is: Which black openings match the Tiger repertoire best? Maybe I will return to that question in a later blog entry.

However, my impression was that you were looking for lines for White. Maybe you mean 1.b4, which more often is called the Sokolsky or Orang-Utan opening. That is not a bad opening but not likely to give White an advantage either.