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Chess Under the Microscope: Magnify Your Chess Strength! (Paperback)

by Paul Motwani (Author)

4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)

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Editorial Reviews

Product Description
The latest of the player's critically acclaimed works in which he presents beautiful and instructive chess in an entertaining and witty style.

About the Author
Paul Motwani has played top board for his country in six Chess Olympiads. Well known for his original and creative approach to chess, he is also an experienced school teacher and chess coach.

Product Details

Paperback: 256 pages
Publisher: Batsford (May 1, 1999)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0713483903
ISBN-13: 978-0713483901
Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces

Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)

Amazon.com Sales Rank: #3,137,890 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover

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Customer Reviews

3 Reviews

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
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Average Customer Review

4.7 out of 5 stars (3 customer reviews)

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4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Chess Under the Microscope, August 5, 2000

By	James (Singapore) - See all my reviews

This book tries to cover chess from many angles. Particularly, I like the way the topics are covered, in an engaging, narrative style that stimulates and gave me a real feeling of having Paul himself beside me, going through mastergames with me.

The deep annotations, insightful suggestions and orginal analysis all points to a well planned and thought out book.

Openings are also covered in a limited but in-depth manner. Along the way, Paul will suggest various alternatives, especially the less obvious and not-so-popular moves that are equally playable and yet present more practical problems for the one seated opposite you.

Get this book. Its a gem that any serious learning chess player should not do without.

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4.0 out of 5 stars It will take some work to get through it ... but it's worth it, November 30, 2008

By	Igelfeld "enpassant_z" (Ca United States) - See all my reviews

First of all, Motwani purposely tried for originality and succeeded. Not everyone walking into a museum of modern art will enjoy every piece and I can see why not everyone will appreciate this book. First off, Motwani uses a third person imaginative character (Mr Fab) as an additional voice in the text. Sometimes he takes it too exageration but that's part of the charm and originality of the book.

Why four stars?
What shouldn't be lost is the amount of valuable content in the book. Motwani uses illustrative games to really demonstrate three things. First, the demonstration and value of aggressive chess for both white and black (two separate sections). Embedded in the games are some extremely useful in context of the game example. This is useful for the improving player because chess is all about analyzing the position at hand and adjusting to ebbs and flow of the game. In addition, Motwani provides some highly original and entertaining chess puzzles with varying degrees of difficulty.

Why only four stars?
In Motwani's attempt to be thorough, he often embeds entire games with comments and sub-variations within the main game. This is great and provides insight into alternatives within a single game, but sometimes it really does water down the point of the original game. It also means that it's nearly impossible to read the book without a chess board. The author actually recommends using two chessboards! There simply isn't enough diagrams to play these games and sub-variations in my head (as hard as I've tried).

In conclusion ...
This book will make you a better player if you put in the work to really go through it with interest. I would suggest first reading Valeri Beim's five star (my rating) book Dynamic Chess Strategy. This gets one warmed up to really appreciate the subtleties of Motwani's dynamic approach (or really in spirit of the book energetic!).
So, if you'd like to get away from passive chess, this is an excellent resource to understand how you can "juice up" your play.

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4 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Motwani is a genius, March 18, 2002

By A Customer

Don't believe negative reviews you read of this book from stuff-shirt blowhards (like Taylor Kingston at chesscafe.com). This is an unbelievably entertaining book that is filled with rich chess games and tremendous enthusiasm. Yes, Motwani does proceed on the premise that every chess player has some kid in him. He does not take himself too seriously, but it is obvious that he is filled with wonder over life on earth, and especially of chess! I predict that his books will all be treasured classics someday. I think you should grab them while you can. I did!

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