My Study List

The promised ‘lessons learned’ is in the works, but it has expanded from one post to a series.  I do not want to rush out a half-finished effort, so hope you will forgive me for the delay.  In the meantime, here is a list of the books and other resources I have found useful in the last year, as well as those I am intending to dig into soon.

Books

Calculation – Jacob Aagaard

A challenging exercise book (with explanations), which I am sure will improve my calculation significantly when I finally manage to finish it.  Not recommended for players rated below 1900.

Chess Tactics from Scratch – Martin Weteschnik

An interesting look at some well-known and less well-known tactical motifs.  I have finished this apart from the exercises at the end, and plan to re-read it at some point.

100 Endgames You Must Know – Jesus de la Villa

An excellent book, focusing only on the endgames the author has identified as being most useful for practical players.  As with ‘Calculation’, I am expecting significant improvement when I finally manage to finish it!

A number of opening books, mostly by Quality Chess and New in Chess.  These will remain secret for now, to avoid giving my future opponents too much information. 🙂

Next on the list: I got the complete Yusupov series for my birthday, and am planning to work mostly on that for the moment.  For those who own these books or other QC improvement books, I suggest you have a look at Jacob Aagaard’s recent post about the best order to read them in (and his answer to my question in the comments).

Videos

Chess24

I became a premium member during the last World Championship Match, lured in by the promise of a free mug and t-shirt.  I never got the promised freebies (in their defence, I haven’t bothered to chase them about it), but have enjoyed the video series immensely.  The only problem is that it is extremely tempting to dive into series like Peter Svidler’s one on the Grunfeld, even though I know working on an opening I do not play with either colour is hardly the most effective use of time. 🙂

Websites

Chess Tempo

Chess Tempo is a website with free tactics puzzles.  It is my home page, and I have a rule that every time I open my browser I must solve at least one puzzle before going to another site.

There are many other resources I have found useful in the past; the selection above is just what I have been working with recently.  Let me know what your favourite chess books, videos and websites are at the moment in the comments section below.

10 thoughts on “My Study List

  1. I think Soltis wrote a book about studying chess. Also Igor Khmelnitsky wrote a series of Chess Exam books. Haven’t seen any of the aforementioned books myself. Wishing you infinite success.

  2. It`s good to know that your road will continue, for one second I thought you were giving up after all the time and effort you’ve been putting in this, I hope you can find all motivation you need to keep going no matter what, even if it takes more time than expected. I really enjoy to visit this website, because I think like most of people around this site, I wanted to earn a GM title too, and you are one of my motivations to keep going as well. Best of luck to you, the journey has just begun, the more you climb the harder it gets, keep going!

  3. As a chess dad of a 13 year old girl (ECF150), I came across your blog when I was hunting for tips to help her along. After a recent slump in performance, I showed your blog to her. Hopefully she will redouble her efforts. Keep going!

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