Sharpen Your Tactics: 1125 Brilliant Sacrifices, Combinations, and Studies [Paperback]

Anatoly Lein (Author), Boris Archangelsky (Author), Lou Hays (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1996

SHARPEN YOUR TACTICS is a chess tactics training book and is for every class of chess player. The examples are rated by difficulty and the problems gradually become more difficult as you move through the book, leading you into the world of high-level chess tactics.

This book will greatly improve the readers chess game.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Sharpen Your Tactics! features 1125 brilliant sacrifices, combinations and studies of chess by Grandmaster Anatoly Lein. Hundreds of these examples of chess wizardry have never before been available in the west. Sharpen Your Tactics! is a unique training book that will be of immense benefit to both the novice and the experienced chess player. Indeed, every class of chess player will benefit from the insights and examples provided by Grandmaster Lein. The examples are rated by difficulty, from easy to very challenging. The problems gradually become more difficult as the reader moves through the book, leading the chess player deeper into the world of high-level chess tactics. Sharpen Your Tactics! will significantly improve the playing of any serious chess student! -- Midwest Book Review

From the Publisher

Sharpen your Tactics! is a delightful and most instructive chess combination book. The book starts with easy combinations and progresses to difficult. The unique thing about this combination book is that most of the problems come from master games played in the old Soviet Union and very few of these have been seen in the west. The authors suggest a systematic training method to get the most benefit from your study time. "Chess is 99% tactics" as Teichmann once said, and tactics will greatly strengthen your game after you have seen and studied the more than 1,000 brilliant combinations in "Sharpen your Tactics!."

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 270 pages
• Publisher: Hays Publishing (September 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1880673134
• ISBN-13: 978-1880673133
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #999,493 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

74 of 82 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars the tactics training book race . . ., July 16, 2002

By 

rationalist "rational one" (Shreveport, LA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sharpen Your Tactics: 1125 Brilliant Sacrifices, Combinations, and Studies (Paperback)

I have all these tactics books and the question is: which one? Well, it essentially comes down to this book or Fred Reinfeld's combo book. Hays' Combination Challenge is just Fred's book in algebraic notation (but useless if you already have Fred's book, unless you hate descriptive notation), and the other book in this genre, 303 Tactical Chess Problems, is for absolute beginner's (1100-1400). I'm personally 1650-1700 USCF (1750 ICC) and would like to tell the differences between these books in my opinion. Lein's book, above, has the following good points : 1) scrambled themes (like a real chess game, no hints as to what you're looking for), 2) the last 200 puzzles (the 4 stars) are harder than anything in Fred's book by a factor of 5!, 3) far more accurate, only found 1 error, so far, by my looking with Fritz/craty18, 4) algebraic notation, 5) many puzzles feature pins+skewers+double attacks+ . . . like REAL combos, not one ISOLATED amateurish tactic. Negatives: 1) overemphasis on mate and stalemate it feels like 75% of problems involve mating threat (in some ways, therefore, oriented to beginning players, and ruining the quality of better players by encouraging you to attack always, even if the position doesn't warrant it . . . so play becomes weak and trappy with overuse), 2) if you find a weakness in your play, like double attacks were weak for me with a Chessbase quiz, you can't get a 100 problems of that theme in one place with which to train (no thematic grouping), 3) the focus on combos of complexity versus single themes makes it hard to implement this stuff in your play -- e.g. you usually plan discovered checks, so having that motif in your head helps you plan. Lein's technique just sharpens tactical OBSERVATION not tactical PLANNING, and 4) some of the problems esp number 1000 and following (at least for me at 1700) are just too hard to do without a board (people who can do this whole book without a board are either not finished, lying, or over USCF expert class . . . Lein says in the introduction to use a board for 3 and 4 stars (although only the 4 stars require, the final position in my head on the 3 stars is occasionally fuzzy . . . ). In short, I prefer ol' Fred's book for actual training, and if I want to see a fancy combo I look at an Alekhine game or read the Informant combo museum piece (Anthology of Combos . . .). Also, my 6 year old son (600 rating) does the first 100 or so problems easily, and as the end problems are like 1900+, you can see the book tries to go from 400 to master, which is a little ridiculous, so that no matter who you are, only like 150 of the 1000+ problems are pitched right at your level. Fred's book is all about 1400-1900 I think, with some reservations at both ends of that range. So for me, my chess weight-lifting tool is still --- Reinfeld's book.

31 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great tactics - improvements of 1001 tactics format, June 24, 2003

By 

Timothy Brennan (Colorado Springs, CO United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sharpen Your Tactics: 1125 Brilliant Sacrifices, Combinations, and Studies (Paperback)

I really liked the format of this book. I love tactics books. The kind with no text in them, and page after page of nothing but chess diagrams. The kind that people on an airplane look at you funny when you are "reading" them.

This book is very similar to the other tactics books out there, but with some improvements that I think are nice. One improvement is that the tactics are labeled with a * symbol to show how difficult the problem is. The more stars the harder it is. This is a nice break from the Reinfeld books which will have a mate in one followed by a mate in ten, and you have no idea beforehand how hard the problem is going to be. I personally like to have some idea of what I am getting into.

Another nice feature is that the answers show where the game came from. I think that this is a nice touch, and gives credit to the people that actually played the game. A lot of books don't do this, and you see puzzles where you know where the game came from - "Oh yeah this is the opera box game", etc, but the author gives no credit where it is due.

I also like that the answers are in algebraic notation, as opposed to descriptive ("e4" versus "pawn to king 4"). Reinfeld's books still have the old school style. One note is that the notation is not really standard. Bxe3 would be Be3, which is a little odd. I got confused at least once when looking up an answer and did not see the "x". I assumed I had the wrong answer when I didn't. But once you know this is the format they use, you can adjust. But it would be nice to see the standard used in the first place.

Overall great tactics book. If you like doing tactics til your eyes bleed, and want something that could be used as part of a "400 points in 400 days" type of study program, this is a good one to add to your collection.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Phenominally better than the Reinfeld book, July 31, 2005

By 

Steven "jammasterlee" (BRIGHTON, Morocco) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sharpen Your Tactics: 1125 Brilliant Sacrifices, Combinations, and Studies (Paperback)

This book is spectacular. It doesn't just throw you in head first as the Reinfeld book does. It actually teaches you thematic combinations and how to look for them. In a deceptively simple way, this book walks you through foundational concepts and later on in to very sophisticated applications of it.

The secret to tactics training isn't that you spend hours and hours and then you finally figure out that one puzzle. You do loads and loads of EASY diagrams that have repetitive tactical themes until you begin seeing them in your sleep. Suddenly your attacking prowess doubles. You see mates that you never saw before. You get the patterns, you understand what it LOOKS like. And then you begin to apply multiple patterns in combination. And that's the beginning of high level chess.

This book does exactly that. Not only that, but you will see some amazingly simple combinations that will literally take your breath away: ridiculous combinations from Tal for example (where he sacks three heavy pieces and then mates with a pawn).

This is easily the best tactics book I've purchased (among Winning Chess, Reinfeld's, and Lev Alburt [though I like the Lev Ablurt book too]). It is certainly usable for all but very very beginner. If you are ranked anywhere above 1100 then this book is for you.