The Queen's Gambit [Hardcover]

Walter Tevis (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1983

Beth Harmon becomes an orphan when her parents are killed in an automobile accident. At eight years old, she is placed in an orphanage in Mount Sterling, Kentucky, where the children are given a tranquillizer twice a day. Plain and shy, she learns to play chess from the janitor in the basement and discovers that she is a chess genius. She is adopted by Alma and Allston Wheatley and goes to a local school, but remains an outsider. Desperate to study chess and having no money, she steals a chess magazine from a newspaper store and then some money from Alma Wheatley and a girl at school, so that she can enter a tournament. She also steals some of the tranquillizers to which she is becoming addicted. At thirteen she wins the tournament, and by sixteen she is competing in the US Open Championship. Like Fast Eddie (in "The Hustler"), she hates to lose.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“The Queen's Gambit is sheer entertainment. It is a book I reread every few years--for the pure pleasure and skill of it.” --Michael Ondaatje

“Compelling. . . . A magnificent obsession.” --Los Angeles Times

“Beth Harmon is an unforgettable creation--and The Queen's Gambit is Walter Tevis's most consummate and heartbreaking work.” --Jonathan Lethem

“Gripping reading. . . .Nabokov's The Defense and Zweig's The Royal Game are the classics: now joining them is The Queen's Gambit.”  --The Financial Times

“More exciting than any thriller I've seen lately; more than that, beautifully written. “ --Martin Cruz Smith, author of GorkyPark

“It’s advisable to tape your fingers before opening The Queen’s Gambit. Otherwise, the suspense may bring on nail-chewing right to the elbow.” --Houston Chronicle

“Tevis traps us in the breathless drama of the moment and makes us feel the same intense involvement his characters feel.” --The Plain Dealer

“There’s more excitement in Beth than in the collected works of Robert Ludlum.” --Forth Worth Star-Telegram --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

From the Inside Flap

Eight year-old orphan Beth Harmon is quiet, sullen, and by all appearances unremarkable. That is until she plays her first game of chess. Her senses grow sharper, her thinking clearer, and for the first time in her life she feels herself fully in control. By the age of sixteen, she?s competing for the U.S. Open championship. But as she hones her skills on the professional circuit, the stakes get higher, her isolation grows more frightening, and the thought of escape becomes all the more tempting. Engaging and fast-paced, The Queen?s Gambit speeds to a conclusion as elegant and satisfying as a mate in four. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 243 pages
• Publisher: Random House Inc (T); 1st edition (February 1983)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0394528018
• ISBN-13: 978-0394528014
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (42 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,303,743 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

65 of 69 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "Rocky" for smart people, May 23, 2003

By 

Jesse Kornbluth (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Queen's Gambit: A Novel (Paperback)

It was the spring of 1983. On a long plane trip, I started THE QUEEN'S GAMBIT by Walter Tevis, a just-published novel I'd bought on impulse. And I was gobsmacked. Tevis --- author of THE MAN WHO FELL TO EARTH and THE HUSTLER (and, later, THE COLOR OF MONEY) --- had written a book that, very simply, could not be put down. The woman who would become my first wife tried to talk to me; I shushed her. A meal came; I pushed it aside. All I could do was read, straight to the end --- weeping, cheering, punching the air.

Amazingly, this novel soon went out of print. And stayed out of print for two decades. Now, at last, it's available again.

What's the fuss about? An eight-year-old orphan named Beth Harmon. Who turns out to be the Mozart of chess. Which brings her joy (she wins! people notice her!) and misery (she's alone and unloved and incapable of asking for help). So she gets addicted to pills. She drinks. She loses. And then, as 17-year-old Beth starts pulling herself together, she must face the biggest challenge of all --- a match with the world champion, a Russian of scary brilliance.

You think: This is thrilling? You think: chess? You think: Must be an "arty" novel, full of interior scenes. Wrong. All wrong.

I tell you: THE QUEEN'S GAMBIT is "Rocky" for smart people.

I tell you: You will care about Beth Harmon more than any fictional character you've encountered in years and years.

I tell you: You will grasp the wrench of loneliness --- and the power of love --- as if this book were happening to you.

Do you need to know anything about chess? Nope. Nothing. Tevis was a storyteller whose genius was to tell great stories; there's nothing between you and the people.

My bet: If you read five pages, you won't put it down. You too will weep. And cheer. And at the end, raise your fist like a fool for a little girl who never existed and a game only wimps play.

28 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I don't play chess, but I loved this book., December 4, 2004

By 

Miles D. Moore (Alexandria, VA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Queen's Gambit: A Novel (Paperback)

I picked up a used copy of "The Queen's Gambit" not because I was fascinated by the subject matter, but because Walter Tevis was a writing professor at Ohio University, my alma mater. (I never had him for a class, though I did interview him for a university publication.) I had never read anything by Tevis--not even his bestsellers, "The Hustler" and "The Man Who Fell to Earth"--but "The Queen's Gambit" makes me want to rush out and find every Tevis book I can. In "The Queen's Gambit," Tevis creates a singular, and singularly moving, lead character--Beth Harmon, an orphaned, alcoholic, drug-addicted teenage girl who also happens to be one of the greatest chess prodigies the world has ever seen. Left alone in the world at the age of eight, hooked on tranquilizers by the monsters who run her orphanage, Beth is buffeted on all sides by enemies and fools. She finds her only lasting solace in the black and white figures on the chessboard, living and reliving those strategies as if her life depends on it (which, in the end, it does). Beth is so real, and so heartrending, that she and her story will linger with you long after you've finished the book. The book contains a great deal of chess terminology and strategy--two things of which I am profoundly ignorant and profoundly uninterested. Yet Tevis made me feel the excitement Beth feels in playing the game, and involved me totally in her life-and-death struggle to master it. Even if you don't like chess, you will like "The Queen's Gambit." My guess is that if you love the game, you will adore "The Queen's Gambit."

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "Isn't it primarily a game for boys?", October 12, 2007

By 

Sebastian Fernandez (Tampa, Florida United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Queen's Gambit: A Novel (Paperback)

Even though the notion expressed on the title of this review has been disproven throughout the years, chess is still a game where males vastly outnumber female players. This was even more pronounced at the time this book was written. But at that same time, an educational experiment by Laszlo Polgar had started, with the idea that kids can achieve exceptional achievements if they were properly trained by a specialist, from an early age. Thus, his three girls became chess players and in 1983, when Tevis wrote this novel, Susan, the eldest, was already a forced to be reckoned with. It was not until years later that the youngest of the three sisters, Judith, really proved that women can compete with men in this sport at the highest level.

I am fairly sure that the Polgar experiment is what Tevis used as the basic premise for writing this book, but then he complemented the idea with a really complex main character, which has to overcome the difficulties set to her by the cards she was dealt in life. This is a really uplifting and emotional story, and Tevis shows his skills as a writer by drawing us into the world of chess with great descriptions of the personalities that populate the royal game. And to tell you the truth, chess is just the vehicle chosen in this case, but the story could have been written with other competitive sports without losing any of its flair, since what is more important is the struggle Elizabeth Harmon undergoes during her childhood, teenage years and young adulthood.

Some people may think I have lost my mind, but I believe that those that do not play or understand chess will have a better time reading this book than serious chess players. There are two reasons for this assertion. First, the author does a great job in describing the games without giving specifics, but using instead a more general approach to the position at hand. This allows him to infuse the situations with excitement for those that would not be able to follow the action otherwise. But the second, and most important, reason is that in some of the passages in which specifics are given, there are serious mistakes. This is going to annoy chess players, while other people will not notice. I was really surprised that Pandolfini proof-read this book and did not correct some of this errors. Just to give a few examples, Tevis talks about a Sicilian defense game that starts with white moving his queen pawn two steps forward, he talks about black going into the Levenfish variation, and even mentions how the Queen's Gambit creates a more complicated middlegame than the Sicilian.

If there were no chess-related mistakes in this novel I would have given it the highest rating, since the story draws you in quickly and keeps you hooked until the end. Chess players will definitely enjoy this book, but my recommendation is to breathe deeply and try to ignore the mistakes, you will have a much better time. I was not completely successful at following my own advice, but the final result was very positive anyway.