This text contains 200 puzzles in which the reader is shown a board from a chess game in progress with the aim of winning the game in a specified number of moves. Both the beginner and the more advanced player will be able to improve their abilities as well as have fun in the process.
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5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Who is this book really for?,
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This review is from: 200 Challenging Chess Puzzles (Paperback)
More negative points than positive: I cannot really recommend this book for any reason.Balance sheet: + 200 chess reasonably good chess puzzles 0 Introduction could have been a page longer: it's rather on the terse side as it is. - Solutions are in old-fashioned descriptive notation - Not all solutions are given - Problem authors are not acknowledged A chess player may not bother about the last point: indeed, any too clear mention that these Puzzles actually are composed problems will probably scare him off for good. The introduction does mention the fact, but it doesn't draw much attention to it. To a chess player, the descriptive notation and the lack of full solutions will surely be more important. The very first puzzle illustrates the second problem: the intended solution begins with 1. Qd1, but there's another one beginning with 1. Se4+, a move rather more likely to be found by an ordinary chess player than the other one. The player who finds the solution beginning with the knight's move will find himself deserted by this book: and as this may happen already in the very first Puzzle given, it seems likely that many readers will put the book aside quickly. There are several other such multi-solutioned puzzles in the book: a random check indicates that of 20 tested puzzles, 4 were faulty (puzzle 1, 6, 36, and 175). I suspect this is not representative: usually about 10% of old problems in a collection turn out to be faulty in some way (multiple solutions, or no solutions). Thus, the editor has to some extent failed here: either to select such problems that have only one solution, or to give *all* solutions to such problems that have more than one. The second type of possible reader, the problemist or problem solver, will probably be more bothered by the lack of attributions and award information. The introduction says that the puzzles are "culled from award-winning chess problems from the past", which makes it so much more important to indicate their history. Actually, it's been standard practice for about 80 years that problems should be correctly attributed to their authors. Problem No. 3 may be recognized as one composed by Samuel Loyd, as may Puzzle 17. I also find a problem by William Pierce, one by Cyril Pearson (both English problem authors from the 19th century), and one by Kohtz and Kockelkorn (a German duo from the same time). I'm much puzzled why the editor has chosen to omit the authors names -- unless it is that including them would be too much of a hint that this is a collection of chess problems, and so scare away most prospective readers. It's also standard practice these days when problems are reprinted to give information about where the problem was taken from. In the 19th century this was more an exception than a rule, and as the problems are from that time, it may be that the lack of source information is only a reflection of the practices of that time. The fact that the solutions include information about discovered checks is another indication that book is a bit out of touch with modern problem publication. The conclusion is: the book is not really good enough for ordinary chess players (no modern notation, incomplete solutions), and it's certainly not nearly good enough for the problem solver (no author names, no awards, and no source information). I feel uncomfortable giving this book even one star, but Amazon won't accept anything lower...
5.0 out of 5 stars
chess book,
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This review is from: 200 Challenging Chess Puzzles (Paperback)
This is a excellent book and reasonably priced as well. Well worth the money.Easy to handle and read as well Well written and easy to comprehend.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Solutions are not good,
This review is from: 200 Challenging Chess Puzzles (Paperback)
The author states in the introduction that one of the challenges of the puzzles is that they have to be solved in the exact number of moves given. Most puzzles are not designed in that way. For example puzzle no.2 after Nb4 if NxR then the only solution is QxB which makes the puzzle mate in 2 not three. Any other move requires more than 3 moves to mate.
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