Chess Tactics for the Tournament Player (Comprehensive Chess Course Series) [Paperback]

Sam Palatnik (Author), Larry Parr (Editor), Jami Anson (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1996

Third in Grandmaster Lev Alburt's Comprehensive Chess Course series. The first two volumes used only materials that worked well in the former U.S.S.R. This book contains hundreds of strikingly beautiful positions arranged by difficulty and designed to sharpen the tactical recognition and vision of experienced players anywhere. Nothing is left to chance.

Product Details

• Paperback: 248 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; 2nd edition (November 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1889323020
• ISBN-13: 978-1889323022
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (27 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #848,912 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I was born in Odessa, Ukraine, home to a fair share of chess grandmasters. There, I started attending chess classes at the age of 9, and I was hooked. Chess opened up a whole new world for me. My favourite metaphor, which I believe to be true, is that chess is a model of life. At the board, you can be creative, daring, and even whimsical.

Off the board, chess was a vehicle for me to escape the Soviet reality. While international travel was restricted to most people, chess allowed me to see the world, meet many interesting people and overcome obstacles.

My chess career was on the rise, and in 1978 I became and International Chess Grandmaster (back when there were only a bit over 100 of us). From that point on, I have won over a dozen class A tournaments, traveled all over the world, until I finally decided to become a coach.

Back in Ukraine, I have earned the title of Emeritus coach of Ukraine, trained numerous famous grandmasters and coached both world and Olympic teams.

In 1994, my family and I moved to the United States. Ever since, I have been training players of all levels (from grandmasters to scholastic players). I have also written several best selling chess books. Now, I am also one of the official USCF coaches for the US Youth players at the Scholastic World Championships, and have also been a coach to the US Olympic Chess Team.

Currently, I reside in Bethesda, MD, very close to Washington, DC and Baltimore areas. Here, I work as an associate director for University of Maryland's at Baltimore County (UMBC) chess team, the strongest collegiate team in the United States, comprised of 4 grandmasters per academic year. I also represent Kasparov Chess Foundation (KCF) as the Greater Mid Atlantic region coordinator. In this capacity, we organize the Greater Mid-Atlantic Scholastic Championships, and hope to conduct more events in the future.

In my spare time, I give private lessons at my residence, conduct chess camps for scholastic players, and continue to write books

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

156 of 159 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Some useful material but not consistant, June 6, 2006

A Kid's Review

This review is from: Chess Tactics for the Tournament Player (Comprehensive Chess Course Series) (Paperback)

Books on chess tactics and chess traps are very useful for improving your game. There are a lot of books on tactics and a small number on chess traps (openings tactics). When comparing CHESS TACTICS FOR THE TOURNAMENT PLAYER to my other book "Learn Chess Tactics" and "Winning Chess Traps" I can say this book is jumpy and often not very clear. It goes from a simple position to work on using one pattern, then jumps to a totally unrelated type of pattern that is very difficult. It is like getting a wild card every time. It still gets three stars because there are some good problems to work on that are helpful to improving your game.

110 of 118 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Does NOT live up to the hype!, December 23, 2004

By 

Alberto Dominguez - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Chess Tactics for the Tournament Player (Comprehensive Chess Course Series) (Paperback)

If this book were truly representative of "the once-secret Russian method of chess training" no Soviet player would ever have become a grandmaster in the entire course of chess history. This book simply does not live up to the hype. Keep in mind as you read the following that according to the authors the alleged goal for these books is "to provide the knowledge necessary to reach expert strength." Nobody is going to reach anything remotely near expert strength using this book or its companions.

My complaints are numerous:
[1] The material oscillates between being absurdly simple for the alleged target audience to being absurdly unclear. For example, at one point they explain what a pin is. Elsewhere, they provide a complicated example from the Fischer-Spassky 1972 match with absolutely zero commentary.
[2] The examples are too many and too sparsely commented (many have no comments at all) to be of any use to a student trying to learn from them. As just one ridiculous example, page 180 contains a 19-move analysis with a single comment ("now follows a beautiful variation"); well, thanks, that was very useful. The famous game Lasker-Bauer, Amsterdam 1889, merits comment to only one move as well.
[3] Many of the examples are downright useless, consisting of a single move. We are given no indication of how the position was arrived at or how the magical move (1. Qa7!!) was arrived at or even why it merits two exclamation points.

The bottom line is if you are rated below 1700, you will not learn anything from this book, so try Jeremy Silman's or Yasser Seirawan's books instead. And if you are rated above 1700, you will not learn anything from this book either, so try Dvoretsky's well-respected series.

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very good., August 16, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Chess Tactics for the Tournament Player (Comprehensive Chess Course Series) (Paperback)

This book is one of the best books out there for chess tactics. The examples they present are clear and of moderate difficlty. He focuses on all tactics and even has some which other books ignore, like destructive combinations. Alburt's best commentary is in the 'How to Calculate Variations' chapter. He tells of common psychological blocks and how to actually calculate which many other tactic books ignore. I recommend this highly. Strong tactical ability is the best asset a chess player can have.