Engaging chess pieces

We are selling a surprisingly high number of copies of a book by Howard Goldowsky, a chess writer from Massachusetts.

The title of Goldowsky’s book is: Engaging Pieces: Interviews and Prose for the Chess Fan. The book consists mainly of interviews with American chess players and writers.

Jennifer Shahade, Mig Greengard and Hikaru Nakamura are among the ones he talks with, as is controversial chess guru Michael (”the blind leading the blind” — Jeremy Silman) de la Maza, who claimed that he gained 400 elopoints in 400 days (by using the tactics program Chess Tactics Art 3.0).

Goldowsky also interviews three authors of recent big general public bestsellers on chess:
Paul Hoffman, the author of King’s Gambit
David Shenk, writer of The Immortal Game
Michael Weinreb, who wrote The Kings of New York.

Interesting and entertaining stuff for anyone with an interest in the wider impact of chess.

Good start for Ponomariov and Mamedyarov

The Essent Tournament has fully started now. The crown group saw its first round today and it was a good one both the audience and for Ponomariov and Mamedyarov. The former FIDE world champion scored an easy win against the current world juniors champion Andriasian while Da Shakh won against Dutch GM Loek van Wely. Werle and Simutowe are leading the open group. full story »

What a way to win

During during the World Championship in Mexico, the computer match Rybka-Zappa was played. In the fourth game something happened that made me lose interest in this match (and actually in computer-computer matches in general). In Chess Today issue 2530 (which came out last Friday) IM Andrey Deviatkin analysed some games of the Rybka-Zappa match and after reading this, I feel obliged to tell the “truth�? about game 4. full story »

Turkish Chess Federation has sued the European Chess Union

The Turkish Chess Federation has sued the European Chess Union on October the 3rd, 2007 in Lausanne. The President of the Turkish Chess Federation, Ali Nihat Yazici (photo), invited the President of European Chess Union Boris Kutin to resign his position as soon as possible. An open letter was published yesterday. full story »

Weekly Endgame Study (40)

Every Saturday an endgame study is published at ChessVibes, selected by Yochanan Afek: player, trainer, endgame study composer and writer. A week later the solution is published. full story »

Essent starts again

It’s that period of the year: leaves are falling down and although we still see the sun quite often, it’s getting slightly colder. Especially in Hoogeveen. It’s mid-October and this means Essent time! Today it’s the start of the 11th edition of the tournament where the players play with chess sets of glass. Well, the four players in the traditional round-robin will. This year they are Ruslan Ponomariov (Ukraine), last year’s winner Shakhriyar Mamedyarov (Azerbeidzan), the highest-rated Dutchman Loek van Wely and World Junior Champion Zaven Andriasyan (Armenia). With an average rating of 2668 (category 17) the tournament promises to bring some interesting fights. full story »

A very good read about chess

No instructions and learning curves today, because Paul Hoffman’s King’s Gambit is just a very good mix of personal memoir and chess essay.

Paul Hoffman, of course, is the author of the international bestseller ‘The Man Who Loved Only Numbers’, the fascinating story of mathematician Paul Erdös.

About Hoffman’s new book Jared Diamond, the author of ‘Guns, Germs and Steel’ said: “a fascinating, fast-moving story with unforgettable characters, many of whom just happen to be chess players.”

Adly leading the World Juniors

After seven of the thirteen rounds, Egyptian GM Ahmed Adly is leading the World Juniors in Yerevan. He is an experienced grandmaster already; in 2005 he became champion of Africa and in 2006 he played the C-group of the Corus Chess Tournament. Ahmed started in Yerevan with what’s sometimes called a Swiss Gambit: he lost in the first round and thus avoided the strongest players in the first half of the tournament. He continued winning rounds 2-7. full story »

Linex-Magic and Monte Carlo win the European Club Cup

With a convincing 4-2 win over Economist SGSEU-1 Saratov, Linex-Magic has won the European Club Cup yesterday. In the final match Kamsky, Rublevsky and Cheparinov scored important victories against Alekseev, Tiviakov and Roiz repectively. The team from Mérida (Spain) won the tournament with 13 points out of 7 matches. Second finished Ural Sverdlovskaya and shared third were Tomsk-400 and OSC Baden-Baden. In the women’s section, Cercle d’Echecs de Monte-Carlo only needed to score one game point to grab the cup and that was exactly what they did: a surprising last-round loss (1-3) against AVS Krasnoturinsk was just enough. Update: game selection 7th round added! full story »

Linex-Magic almost there

After a hard-fought victory over Tomsk-400, it’s the Spanish champion Linex-Magic that has the best papers in the European Club Cup. Tomsk’s Karjakin scored a fine win against Mickey Adams but the match was decided by Rublevsky and Cheparinov, who beat Kasimdzhanov and Bologan respectively. Anand and Svidler’s OSC Baden-Baden drew again and lost their chances for the Cup. full story »

The Fabulous Budapest Gambit

It has surprise value, it is easy to learn, and it leads to sharp and dynamic play early on in the game: the Budapest Gambit remains popular for very understandable reasons.

That is why we are particularly happy with the spirited new book our printers have just delivered: The Fabulous Budapest Gambit by Viktor Moskalenko.

Former Ukrainian Champion GM Moskalenko was initially sceptical, but when he started playing the Budapest its all-round appeal struck him. Since then, he has won many games with it.

Moskalenko does not heap loads of computer-generated variations on you, but has written a seductive book, explaining the plans, threats, and tricks, as well as the strategic foundations, for both Black and White.

If you like dynamic chess, then this book will probably appeal to you.

Jan Timman at the John Watson Show

Already for a few months now, IM John Watson hosts a weekly show on Chess.FM. The well-known chess writer and reviewer has had guests of different calibers but the focus is always on chess books. Tomorrow night Watson has a very special guest in his weekly 60+ minute show: GM Jan Timman. full story »

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