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László Polgár

Chess: 5334 Problems, Combinations and Games Paperback – Illustrated, August 13, 2013

by László Polgár (Author), Bruce Pandolfini (Introduction)

1,037 ratings

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The most complete collection of chess problems ever published, including 5,334 instructional situations, presented by the world's leading chess teacher

Chess analyzes more than 5,000 unique instructional situations, many taken from real matches, including 306 problems for checkmate in one move, 3,412 mates in two moves, 744 mates in three moves, 600 miniature games, 144 simple endgames, and 128 tournament game combinations. Chapters are organized by problem type. Each problem, combination, and game is keyed to an easy-to-follow solution at the back of the book, so readers can learn as they go. More than 6,000 illustrations make it easy to see the possibilities any position may hold. The book also includes the basic rules of the game and an international bibliography.

Chess is the ultimate book on winning the game.

Reading age

8 years and up
Print length

1104 pages
Language

English
Dimensions

6 x 2.38 x 9.13 inches
Publisher

Black Dog & Leventhal
Publication date

August 13, 2013
ISBN-10

1579125549
ISBN-13

978-1579125547
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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Bruce Pandolfini is perhaps the most experienced chess teacher in North America. He is the author of eighteen instructional chess books, and was portrayed by Ben Kingsley in the film Searching for Bobby Fischer.

László Polgáris a Hungarian chess teacher whose writing and strategies are respected and known worldwide. He holds the title of master coach and coached his daughters, Susan, Judit, and Sophia, to several world championships and Olympic gold medals. They host the annual Global Chess Festival in Budapest.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Black Dog & Leventhal; Illustrated edition (August 13, 2013)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 1104 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1579125549
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1579125547
Reading age ‏ : ‎ 8 years and up
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.78 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 2.38 x 9.13 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #21,570 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #12 in Math Games
- #18 in Chess (Books)
- #30 in Puzzle & Game Reference (Books)

Customer Reviews:
1,037 ratings

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Top reviews from the United States

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C. carnesTop Contributor: Chess

Chess Pattern recognition Masterpiece

Reviewed in the United States on February 11, 2018

Verified Purchase

When I was learning to play jazz guitar I struggled for years to figure out how to play at really fast tempos until I learned the secret of memorizing 3 and 4 note 'motives' that I had so well memorized that I could play them with out thinking. Think of this book as 5334 chess 'motives'. These are the 'guitar licks' of chess. Play them over and over and over until you don't even have to think when you see them. They become automatic. Then when your clock is ticking you won't miss that 3 move checkmate that you only had 60 seconds to find. It does no good at all to build up a winning position if you cannot finish off your opponent quickly and efficiently. There are plenty of sites on the internet where you can practice tactics. They will NOT do what this book does, which is systematically train your eyes to recognize the patterns of trapping and killing an opponent's King. The ONLY problem with this book is it is BIG and the diagrams are rather small... But, hey! That is because it is a treasure trove. One hour a day every day with this book and your chess 'eyes' will improve without fail. After working on this book for weeks the one unexpected takeaway is that the beauty of these puzzles eventually turns working on tactics from a drudgery into something inspiring and fascinating. I never quite appreciated the aesthetics of chess as much as I do now after being shocked and awed by the beauty of something as seemingly simple as a mate in two.

120 people found this helpful

Helpful

Puneet S. Lamba

A fantastic labor of love!

Reviewed in the United States on October 14, 2020

Verified Purchase

The three Polgar sisters are all the evidence needed to demonstrate that practice makes perfect. All three sisters reached pinnacles of success in chess that few can aspire to. All because their father, the author of this book, trained them obsessively on every possible pattern in chess. Especially the checkmate, which is the focus of this book.

I can tell you from my own experience playing competitive chess that even very capable players frequently miss winning opportunities because they are not sufficiently trained to identify and execute every possible checkmate permutation and combination.

The reviewer who called it a pattern recognition masterpiece is exactly right. Once you understand the basic concepts, further development as a chess player comes down to recognizing winning patterns. The 1000+ pages in this book will provide hours, days, and years of pattern recognition practice to any aspiring chess player.

I won't say, however, that this is the only book or training you need. This book needs to be supplemented with an understanding of opening patterns, middlegame tactics like forking, opposition, discovered attacks, double attacks, endgame strategies, and more which are adequately covered in many books including Jeremy Silman's "The Complete Book of Chess Strategy: Grandmaster Techniques from A to Z". These two books combined with all of the materials and videos available in the public domain represent a solid foundation for chess and will take you very far in terms of growing as an intermediate and advanced chess player.

I do recommend the hardcopy version of this book for the sheer quality of the publication and pleasure of flipping through page after crisp page of high-quality puzzles as your confidence grows with each hour you spend with this encyclopedic treasure from Laszlo Polgar.

Enjoy!

Edit:

All of what I said above is true of the first few chapters where the answers are sufficient to understand the puzzles. But once you get beyond those, the answers are in the form of the best move that doesn't lead to checkmate or capture or anything tangible. It is similar to looking at a chess engine's preferred best move and is often somewhat hard to understand WHY it is the best move. And the book offers no assistance in this respect. For this reason I must, with a heavy heart, downgrade the book from 5 stars to 4.

Instead, I will recommend 1001 Chess Exercises by Masetti and Messa, which follows a similar format as Polgar but contains full solutions to the exercises at the end of the book.

12 people found this helpful

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Malamati

Cheap to Acquire, Priceless to Your Chess Growth

Reviewed in the United States on June 17, 2018

Verified Purchase

Beginner or expert, this remarkable book of exercises can help you learn chess tactics--the bread and butter of successful play. I own this book in hard copy--a massive boat anchor--and as soon as I found it in Kindle format. The convenience is incredible--the print form sits on my shelf of chess books, unused, but this is getting full use.

Do understand that it's a perfect book for the beginner, since the "mate in 1" problems will help the novice to understand both simple and quite sophisticated piece moves. Learn the piece moves, and immediately begin to see and solve fundamental chess problems...a fun and practical way for the beginner to learn the essentials of piece placement, critical squares, and the full range of tactical moves for success. The more difficult problems will challenge club, expert, and even master-level players, so you can benefit from this book at whatever level you achieve. At $3, this is indispensible.

24 people found this helpful

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Sayaword

Good book

Reviewed in the United States on May 9, 2017

Verified Purchase

I bought kindle version. I read it through kindle cloud reader in web browser, ipad and iphone. It is quite good. The format is one puzzle per page. The image can be magnified to whole page and easy to read.
The answers of puzzle are located on appendix. There is a link in each puzzle in which link to the answer. There is also a link in answer page to go back to original puzzle page. It is convenience to check answer.
The mate in 1 puzzles are easy but mate in 2 or 3 are more difficult. It is a good training to my calculation skill.

45 people found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

Great book. It will keep any chess player occupied ...

Reviewed in the United States on January 17, 2017

Verified Purchase

Great book. It will keep any chess player occupied for a long time. The problems start from mate in one with endgame scenarios up to mate in three. The combinations section afterward is very good as well. I must warn once you get pass the introduction there is nothing but problems no words or annotations just at the top of the page it will say white or black mate in (scenario 1-3). I'm new to chess but fell in love with the game I got the book for Christmas this year and I'm already of problem 1102 (I tried my own version of the 7 circles chess program I had off work for about a week and a half for the holidays and just tackled the problems) My friend who is rated around 1900 says this is a good book to have. I looked up the Polgar sisters and see why they are as good as they are having this training as early as 5 years old and sticking with it is genius in its selfirst. I'm enjoying this book a lot.

29 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Boris Johnson

Great material for teaching kids.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 25, 2017

Verified Purchase

This book is of very little use to anybody who can play chess to any decent level, the first third of the book show's the moves and a few rules and then provides hundreds of completely facile mates in one. Not even tricky or interesting mates in one, something completely simple like moving the rook in order to backrank mate a king stood behind his pawns. However, these are great little excersises to give to kids who are just learning to play. My daughter and I have done just 6 of these every night before bed for a week, and it has significantly strengthened her play from almost random to weakly focused, so heading in the right direction.

You could easily create a problem like this yourself without the book, but could you create 600 of them without making a mistake? Probably not.

The endgame chapter is pretty much the same thing, overkill mates, queening a runaway pawn and so on. Again, great material for kids. For those chapters alone it is worth the price.

You also then get a load of sample games And a tonne of mates in 2 and 3. Unfortunately these are not complex enough to provide any calculation training, it is all about pattern recognition.

If you are an adult who either wants to learn chess or has just started to learn, if you don't know what a back rank mate is, even if you have played graded chess and your grade is below about 800 elo, then this book will be great for you, below 1200 elo there is probably something in it for you.

Above 1200 elo, I would say this is a complete waste money.

13 people found this helpful

DLM

Great for an obsessive young chess player.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 6, 2019

Verified Purchase

When I saw this I thought it might be ideal for our 12 year old. Certainly enough problems that he can achieve and plenty more for years to come. Probably this year's most successful Christmas present!

2 people found this helpful

ioannis

Recommend!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 11, 2015

Verified Purchase

Brilliant for the transition form beginners to intermediate player. Massive collection of checkmate problems but the most interesting bit is the combination part. Really enjoyable and excellent teaching reference.

One person found this helpful

Martin Pepper

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 30, 2018

Verified Purchase

Great

Stephen H.

Useful

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 1, 2019

Verified Purchase

Good read

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