Customer Reviews

Standard Chess Openings (Cardoza Chess Books)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

If you own "Modern Chess Openings" and/or "Nunn's Chess Openings" you have a nice one volumne reference book, relatively free of of typos or mistakes in analysis. I would not hesitate to recommend this as an additional book to cross reference for additional analysis. Schiller's book actually has more analysis, but I would not totally trust it, with typos alone being common it puts a question to things. If you are a beginner skip owning a reference book as a first book and consider getting a book more on ideas such as "Understanding the Openings" along with "Winning Chess Traps; Tactics in the Opening" to learn the opening tactics (also recommended for intermediate players too). As said, I would recommend "Standard Chess Openings", only after owning "MCO" and/or "NCO". Opening reference books are usefull for intermediate players on up.

A very disappointing book. It has a lot of pages but no opening is covered in anything like real depth.

It tries to show how games develop beyond the opening, which is admirable, but often these games proceed way beyond any relevance to the position that came out of the opening and the type of play that is characteristic.

There are also enormous gaps in the coverage with no mention of almost all the main lines in openings such as Sicilian Najdorf.

These ommissions combined with very poor error checking (in some cases 1. e4 appears when it should be 1.d4) mean this is not a book I'd recommend to anyone. Not because it's THAT bad but there are much better books available.

If you want to buy a 'fat' openings book, buy Nunns Chess Openings which is in a totally different class. NCO is very comprehensive, up-to-date and the condensed text which introduces each opening gives a much better overview than Schiller's work. But then NCO is authored by three leading grandmasters, among others ...

I consider myself an average chess player, that is I play at what I estimate to be 1400 - 1600 ELO. I do not consider myself an expert an eny opening, but am comfortable with a couple of openings mainly the Roy Lopez, Guico Piano, and QP openings.
I was hoping that his book would help me learn the basics of some more openings, the way that Chernev's Logical Chess helped me with the QP openings. This book was a complete disapointment, I didn't learn a thing from it. The main problems I had with it were the lack of explanation to each opening and the basic format. The basic format of the book is to take one game and use this game to show the main variations in the opening. I found that this made it hard to use.

I applaud and respect Mr. Schiller for his devotion and the hard work that he evidently put toward this enormous book and its companion, "Unorthodox Chess Openings." In general, they are both quite well-researched and informative, but there are two major problems with each of them.

First, although there are plenty of interesting variations, I would've liked to have seen a little more personal insight and analysis given.

Second, and more importantly, there are entirely too many mistakes. Each volume has typographical errors, grammatical errors, sequence errors, duplications, omissions, incorrect diagrams, etc. Also, the layout of the sub-variations is a little sloppy (There are a few lines that are actually impossible to follow in this particular format). This is not acceptable in a book of this magnitude.

Overall, an ambitious work, but I think it really needs to be proofread and reedited.

This book does exactly what the author intended it to do. It is NOT an in-depth book for every variation. It is a good, solid book with lots of verbage to help you understand the basics of a new opening.

Do you think you may want to investigate several new lines, but are not sure if you want to buy a whole library on that one variation? Get this book. I guarantee you will be pulling it down off the shelf after every visit to the club. "What was that line that person played?" Eric will enlighten you in a way the average player should be able to grasp it. Buy MCO, and you will have a most complete set of reference books.

I am not normally a fan of Mr. Schiller's books (The Big Book of Busts excepted -- it's excellent), but I was pleasantly surprised by SCO. For those of you breathlessly awaiting something, anything, to replace the now ancient BCO2 and MCO13, this is not it. Instead, this more in the spirit of Fine's The Ideas Behind the Chess Openings, but on a colossal scale. Instead of lines or columns of moves ending in an evaluation, Schiller follows benchmark games that illustrate the themes and strategies of the openings. This is probably the best way to learn the openings and SCO has the advantage over Fine's book in being more recent and much more thorough. Those looking for the new MCO or BCO are out of luck, but those looking to learn about the openings could do far worse. Additionally, this is an outstanding value at 2 1/2 cents per page.

For those hoping that this new book will fill the void left by the conspicuous delay of BCO3 and MCO14, expect disappointment. For those fans of venerable opening primers like I.A. Horowitz' How to Win in the Chess Openings, Reuben Fine's Ideas Behind the Chess Openings and Ludek Pachman's The Opening Game in Chess, you have found an up-to-date successor. SCO is a huge compendium of benchmark games illustrating typical ("standard"!) themes for Black and White in each of the conventional openings. This is a good single-volume reference for players that are trying to find out what is supposed to happen after the first 10-15 moves have been played. This is not a reference work for postal players or studious over-the-board players looking for the latest theory in multiple lines of an opening. Consider SCO an adjunct to books like BCO2/MCO13 that are long on variations but short on explanations. Amazon's discounted price represents an excellent value -- 800 pages for $20 comes out to 2 1/2 cents per page, an uncommon value in chess books today. My only major criticism is that the text gets pretty crowded and a little difficult to follow at times. After a series of (,{;[,]:}>) etc., it is easy to lose one's place. Though I have not always been a fan of Schiller's books, this one is a good value and one of his stronger efforts.

Eric Schiller has really answered the prayers for such a magnificent book on Chess Openings. This book is really excellent as it caters to the needs of different levels of players (especially for novice). It has detailed explanations for the theme behind each major openings & some on the variations. Also, Eric has given some good advice as to what repertoire to employ according to the skill(experience) of the players in question. Especially of interest are the ECO codes found at the back of the book. Books from MCO & NCO does not include such ECO codings. Overall, Eric Schiller has written a very comprehensive & detailed treatise on Modern Chess Openings. It'll surely be the de-facto standard for the serious chess players. It definitely deserves a place in the chess library. Highly recommended.

Well, I think you get the point from the heading of this review.

First of all...the analysis is terrible. For example, in the game between Ivanchuk and Shirov in the section on the Semi-Slav defense, he gives 23...d4!! as such an excellent move...it's a BLUNDER!!! Black loses 12 moves later with no way to improve his moves. Matthew Sadler in his book on the semi-slav (Game 1) even points out it's a blunder. Let's see now...Sadler is in the top 50 in the world, Schiller is a United States National Master (The United States is WEAK compared to other countries, and I come from the USA). I think with White winning, no ?'s by either side after move 23, and Sadler being much higher ranked...I'd trust him over schiller.

Spelling Issues: I don't think I need to dive into the "horible mispelings dat dis buuk iz ful of, as the othur revues alrady writen wil point dis out".

Grammar Issues: Also all you have do is read introduction to already see grammar really really bad.

Finally, what do you call a dumb statement like "some lines I cover more simply because I know them better" in an introduction to a book for what is obviously a beginner? Does this mean that if Schiller say, knows the Torre Attack, but doesn't know the Trompowsky Attack, he basically would just make up junk as he goes along?

What is this author trying to do to the chess world? It seems to me that he figures he's obviously not good enough to write a real book that an expert would read, so let's just sucker the beginners into buying his books...they'll fall for buying his junk, waste their money, and will Schiller care...heck no!!! He's got all the money in the world now.

DON'T BUY THIS BOOK!!!!!!!

I am thoroughly enjoying this book. It has lots of good analysis and illustrative games, but I especially enjoy his commentary on openings. He constantly says whether an opening is used by conservative players, aggeressive players, world champions, etc. He adds helpful editoril comments that are greatly helpful in determining whether I wish to further explore a certain opening. FInally, the book is well-made on excellent papaer and a great binding.