An Encyclopaedia of Chess Wisdom by Eric Schiller

This was the first book I bought to help my game. At the time I was playing mostly online and barely knew how the pieces moved, and while this book is good for giving the beginner player a few handy pointers on what to do with each of the pieces and a few strategic and tactical concepts, it does not justify its £16 price tag.

There are two main problems with the book; firstly it tries to cover too much ground, and secondly it is inaccurate.

As a book aimed at the beginner one expects that it would deal with the main tactical themes in as simple a fashion as possible. Instead it gets into a number of fairly advanced tactical themes very quickly, including all manner of sacrifices which are of little use to the inexperienced player. Further to this it explains the ideas in long strings of algebraic notation, with side variations which quickly lost and confused me. These strings and side variations often end with a comment like “which is clearly better for black” or something equally unhelpful to a novice.

The second big problem with the book, which has only become apparent to me on re-reading it with a better knowledge of algebraic notation, is that there are a great number of errors in the notes. No wonder I found them so confusing to follow to begin with! This is not just a few typos (almost every book has a few typos if you look hard enough); this is repeated mistakes that must play havoc with anyone trying to learn from the games.

One might be inclined to think that this book must be aimed at a more advanced player, one that can follow the algebra better. However the games are not really covered in enough depth for a more advanced player and the tactical themes are better studied through practical examples. As such this book falls between two stools.

It is a shame because Eric Schiller is a good annotator on the internet, and his opening manuals are also good from what I know of them. This book seems rushed, badly thought out and designed to grab the attention of newbies (and their money), without delivering what it promises on the cover.