Cranky Chess

Cranky Old Man Gaming
For reasons unknown, I have always enjoyed sorting, ranking and rating. Here, I present my favorite chess books, and favorite chess games. When I rank chess games, I rank both my own experience (Enjoyment and Re-playability) and the instructional value for different levels of players. This is based on being an off an on chess instructor for many years (example lesson here). Beginner is defined < 1200 rating including unrated players, Intermediate are players from 1200-1800, and Advanced players are 1800+. Rating is defined using a formula that accounts for all factors.

Last Updated 11/13/2023

Chess Book Author Summary
1 Tal Botvinnik 1960 Mikhail Tal Tal, one of the most exciting attacking players in history, describes his world championship match against Botvinnik, one of the most strategic chess players in history. Tal's annotations are amazing, candidly describing his thoughts during each game, and the games are great, full of interesting and instructive moments. I would highly recommend this book for players of all levels. Example game: Tal Botvinnik World Championship Game 1
2 My Best Games of Chess 1908-1939 Alexander Alekhine The best piece of chess improvement advice I ever got was to study the thoughts of World Champions when annotating their own games. The idea is each world champion is the best person of their generation at defining a coherent system for thinking about chess, and explaining that system. In that sense this book might be the greatest learning resource for the largest number of people. Alexander Alekhine presents 100 deeply annotated games from an era in which the ideas are complex enough to be relevant to modern chess, but not so complex as to be indigestible to the average player. Example game: Bogoljubov - Alekhine
3 My Great Predecessors Part I Garry Kasparov The first book in an ambitious series by Garry Kasparov, aiming to describe all of chess history through the lens of the world champions that preceded him. I consider this series the best way to learn about chess history and is an absolute treasure even if you don't look at the games. The games add a lot though, as Kasparov does a great job of selecting games that demonstrate the potency of the players and the evolution of their ideas. Kasparov does get a little distracted by the hunt for truth, adding a lot of deep computer-aided analysis that detract from the games, but if you ignore this the games and history are wonderfully inspiring for beginner and master alike. Part I covers chess history up through Alekhine (1946) which I think is perhaps the most interesting era as the play evolves from looking quite poor by modern standards, to a degree of excellence shown by players like Capablanca and Alekhine that many modern grandmasters still dream of. Example games: Morphy Opera Game , Morphy - Anderssen
4 Logical Chess Move by Move Irving Chernev This book was my first introduction to what a chess player should be thinking about during a chess game and is my top recommendation to all new players. It presents 33 games, annotating each one with the reasoning behind each move. The games are chosen with clear purpose, cleanly demonstrating common chess themes and ideas. Example game: Scheve - Teichmann
5 A Modern Guide to Checkmating Patterns Vladimir Barsky Tactics are a combination of pattern recognition, and calculation. The best way to learn the patterns is to solve numerous problems with similar tactical themes. This book is an excellent resource for that, presenting common mating themes broken down by piece and pattern.
6 Silman's Complete Endgame Course Jeremy Silman My favorite endgame book for beginning and intermediate players. Silman presents key common endgames, organized by the rating level you should know them by. This is a jaw droppingly obvious way to organize things once you hear it, and yet I have never seen another book organized in this fashion. Sadly I had already learned all the endgames in the book in some hodgepodge fashion before running into this book, but I cannot recommend it enough for new players that want to work on their endgame.
7 My 60 Memorable Games Bobby Fischer Beloved by many, I have never really been able to get into this book and I’m not sure why. There are some excellent games in this book, and the short paragraphs introducing the context of each game are great. The comments, while sometimes extremely insightful, are a bit sparse. It is a little hard to tell what level the book was written for. I do enjoy many of the games though, particularly the endgames. The accuracy with which Fischer clamps down on opponent counter play can be inspiring. Example game: Fischer - Larsen
8 100 Endgames You Must Know: Vital Lessons for Every Chess Player Jesus de la Villa While I recommend Silman's Endgame book more often to students, this is my personal favorite. The endgames covered are more cover some more advanced concepts than Silman's book but are more interesting and accessible than Dvoretsky's Endgame manual. The Chessable version is probably my favorite Chessable course, as quizzing yourself regularly on some of the chapters is a wonderful way to make sure you have mastered key technical positions.
9 Combinative Motifs Maxim Blokh This Russian gem is one of my favorite tactics books, though it can be a bit hard to find for us western folks. It contains ~1200 combinations meticulously sorted by tactical motif. Most positions are actually two problems in one, as it can be solved for one solution as white, and another solution for black. This is ideal for people setting up the position on an actual chess board, since you get almost twice the problems per time spent setting up positions. The difficulty level of each position is marked next to the problem (one for white and one for black). I like this feature as it lets me decide whether to just solve it while looking at the diagram or set things up on a board if it is considered difficult. Probably the most thoughtfully designed tactics book I have ever come across.
10 Endgame Strategy M. I. Shereshevsky When I was a kid, I loved endgames and picked up basically any endgame chess book I found at the used bookstore. This was probably my favorite. It concentrates on basic principles for how to play endgames, like when to exchange, king centralization, the two weakness principle, etc.. The examples are a bit messy and might be hard for a beginner to follow, but if you are an experienced player, but feel uncomfortable in endgames, this book is for you. Note, this review only addresses the original version, and I have not read the new expanded edition.
11 Chess: 5334 Problems, Combinations and Games Laszlo Polgar A giant tomb of mostly mate problems by papa Polgar (father to the famous Polgar sisters). There are 306 mate in ones, and over 3400 mate in two's, which get progressively harder. I have only done half the mate in two's and at that point I had been finding at least of the recent problems extremely challenging. It might not be the most efficient way to learn mating patterns, but if you enjoy sitting and solving for long periods of time, by the time you finish all the mate in twos you will have mastered the building blocks for all common mating patterns, most uncommon mating patterns, and have significantly improved board vision.
12 Chess Duels: My Games with the World Champions Yasser Seirawan Seirawan is an interesting guy. There was a time in my youth that it felt like he was the best player in the United States, but instead of competing he retired from professional chess and started what I consider the best chess magazine ever, Inside Chess. In this book he tells his story through his many encounters with Chess World champions, and the games and annotations are great. Possibly the games are not quite as interesting as if he was free to pick from a wider selection of games, but the stories are better. The book was an enjoyable read even if you don’t look at the games, but if you do I would consider My 60 Memorable Games a better book for the pure chess enjoyment of Fisher’s games. Example game:Seirawan - Smyslov
13 Garry Kasparov's Greatest Chess Games Volume 2 Igor Stohl Igor presents a nice summary of each year of the 2nd half of Gary Kasparov's career, and presents 59 well annotated games. Kasparov's approach to chess is very dynamic and calculation intensive, two things that never appealed to me that much even as a youth. Still, I must admit his games can be very interesting and instructive. I have not looked at all the games, but the ones I have looked over have great annotations. Very detailed, but with good explanations instead of crazy computer lines. I do miss the missing games against Karpov, though, as the clash of styles between Karpov and Kasparov made for some of the most consistently interesting chess I have ever seen. Kasparov - Topalov Seven Deadly Chess Sins (14)
14 Seven Deadly Chess Sins Jonathan Rowson Rowson seems an erudite fellow, and as is common in such cases his book is full of a lot of nonsense with a few interesting thoughts sprinkled in. In some cases, it is pure philosophy with seemingly no point or conclusion. In other cases, he says something like “talk to your pieces” with no real definition, but enough examples that you eventually get the idea is “don’t let your pieces be bad.” I find the lack clarity and practicality of the message “talk to your pieces” compared to phrases like “when in doubt, take your worst piece and make it better” frustrating. Overall the book feels like you are taking a journey with the author through his personal process of discovery of how to play chess well, which is great if his process is intuitive for you, but to me it is not, and I much prefer books like The Road to Chess Improvement by Alex Yermolinsky that do the same thing in a way that feels much more intuitive. That said, an honest and earnest exploration of a strong player’s journey to chess understanding has real value, and this book is not useless. For example, his description of his thought process as he jumps back and forth between lines of analysis seems more real and instructive than more theoretical (and less realistic) descriptions of thought process such as in Think Like a Grandmaster by Kotov.
15 Improve Your Chess Results Vladimir Zak I don't find any of the advice in this book very compelling, but the games of strong young players combined with some insightful annotations gives this book value. There are definitely some games in this book that made a strong impression on young Cranky. Example game: Spassky - Avtonomov
16 Black to play and win with 1-g6: A complete defensive system Andy Soltis Many of the systems in this book are not objectively good, but I really enjoyed this book when it came out (1988), particularly the deliciously unintuitive elements of the Gurgenidze. I have seen modern players like Alireza Firouzja and Magnus Carlsen whipping out similar systems in blitz games, so it is clear understanding the type of systems and structures presented in this book is still relevant, even if the specific recommendations do not always stand-up to modern preparation. Example game: Lanka - Gipslis
17 Bobby Fischer rediscovered Andrew Soltis There are better Fischer books in terms of stories, and better Fischer books in terms of game annotations. Still, if you receive this book as a gift, you will enjoy paging through over a hundred fun Fischer games. Example game: Byrne - Fischer
18 New York International Chess Tournament 1984 Jeffrey Naier My favorite aspect of this book is that my copy is signed by GM Edmar Mednis, who gifted it to me sometime after I had decided not to pursue chess seriously, but before I had stopped taking free gifts from the U.S. Chess Federation. It contains all the games from a tournament of strong masters, with a few annotated by one the players and most completely unannotated. Mednis believed going through all the games in a tournament gave you a feel for the competitive aspect of chess play that you could not pick up any other way. For example, you will see strong players blunder much more in this kind of book than a best games collection, which can be inspiring to young players trying to win titles and getting frustrated with their own mistakes. Example game: Larsen - Soltis

The table below contains games I have gone over and annotated, often while streaming.

Chess Game Year Rating Enjoyment Re-playability Quality Cultural Impact Beginner Intermediate Advanced
1 Morphy Opera Game 1859 8.24 10 10 5.23 9.13 10 7 3
2 Bogoljubov - Alekhine 1922 7.18 8.5 9 6.93 2.00 6 8 9
3 Spassky - Fischer World Championship Game 6 1972 7.14 8 8.5 7.8 1 7 9 9
4 Kasparov - Topalov 1999 6.91 7.5 9 8.05 7.67 2 5 6
5 Byrne - Fischer 1956 6.44 5 6 7.85 9.20 6 6 6
6 Tal Botvinnik World Championship Game 1 1960 6.07 7 8 8.5 0 3 7 8
7 Morphy - Anderssen 1858 6.03 6.5 6 5.9 2.67 10 8 4
8 Fischer - Larsen 1958 6.00 7 8 8.5 0 5 8 8
9 Seirawan - Smyslov 1993 4.74 5 4 7.88 0 4 5 8
10 Spassky - Avtonomov 1949 4.50 6 4 6.85 0 7 4 2
11 Lanka - Gipslis 1984 3.99 5 2 7.9 0 2 5 5
12 Anderssen - Kleseritsky 1851 3.67 3.5 3.5 -0.15 7.00 3.5 5 4
13 Scheve - Teichmann 1907 3.46 4 2 5.53 0 8 4 1
14 Larsen - Soltis 1984 2.88 3 2 7.5 0 1 3 3

	Chess Book	Author	Summary
1	Tal Botvinnik 1960	Mikhail Tal	Tal, one of the most exciting attacking players in history, describes his world championship match against Botvinnik, one of the most strategic chess players in history. Tal's annotations are amazing, candidly describing his thoughts during each game, and the games are great, full of interesting and instructive moments. I would highly recommend this book for players of all levels. Example game: Tal Botvinnik World Championship Game 1
2	My Best Games of Chess 1908-1939	Alexander Alekhine	The best piece of chess improvement advice I ever got was to study the thoughts of World Champions when annotating their own games. The idea is each world champion is the best person of their generation at defining a coherent system for thinking about chess, and explaining that system. In that sense this book might be the greatest learning resource for the largest number of people. Alexander Alekhine presents 100 deeply annotated games from an era in which the ideas are complex enough to be relevant to modern chess, but not so complex as to be indigestible to the average player. Example game: Bogoljubov - Alekhine
3	My Great Predecessors Part I	Garry Kasparov	The first book in an ambitious series by Garry Kasparov, aiming to describe all of chess history through the lens of the world champions that preceded him. I consider this series the best way to learn about chess history and is an absolute treasure even if you don't look at the games. The games add a lot though, as Kasparov does a great job of selecting games that demonstrate the potency of the players and the evolution of their ideas. Kasparov does get a little distracted by the hunt for truth, adding a lot of deep computer-aided analysis that detract from the games, but if you ignore this the games and history are wonderfully inspiring for beginner and master alike. Part I covers chess history up through Alekhine (1946) which I think is perhaps the most interesting era as the play evolves from looking quite poor by modern standards, to a degree of excellence shown by players like Capablanca and Alekhine that many modern grandmasters still dream of. Example games: Morphy Opera Game , Morphy - Anderssen
4	Logical Chess Move by Move	Irving Chernev	This book was my first introduction to what a chess player should be thinking about during a chess game and is my top recommendation to all new players. It presents 33 games, annotating each one with the reasoning behind each move. The games are chosen with clear purpose, cleanly demonstrating common chess themes and ideas. Example game: Scheve - Teichmann
5	A Modern Guide to Checkmating Patterns	Vladimir Barsky	Tactics are a combination of pattern recognition, and calculation. The best way to learn the patterns is to solve numerous problems with similar tactical themes. This book is an excellent resource for that, presenting common mating themes broken down by piece and pattern.
6	Silman's Complete Endgame Course	Jeremy Silman	My favorite endgame book for beginning and intermediate players. Silman presents key common endgames, organized by the rating level you should know them by. This is a jaw droppingly obvious way to organize things once you hear it, and yet I have never seen another book organized in this fashion. Sadly I had already learned all the endgames in the book in some hodgepodge fashion before running into this book, but I cannot recommend it enough for new players that want to work on their endgame.
7	My 60 Memorable Games	Bobby Fischer	Beloved by many, I have never really been able to get into this book and I’m not sure why. There are some excellent games in this book, and the short paragraphs introducing the context of each game are great. The comments, while sometimes extremely insightful, are a bit sparse. It is a little hard to tell what level the book was written for. I do enjoy many of the games though, particularly the endgames. The accuracy with which Fischer clamps down on opponent counter play can be inspiring. Example game: Fischer - Larsen
8	100 Endgames You Must Know: Vital Lessons for Every Chess Player	Jesus de la Villa	While I recommend Silman's Endgame book more often to students, this is my personal favorite. The endgames covered are more cover some more advanced concepts than Silman's book but are more interesting and accessible than Dvoretsky's Endgame manual. The Chessable version is probably my favorite Chessable course, as quizzing yourself regularly on some of the chapters is a wonderful way to make sure you have mastered key technical positions.
9	Combinative Motifs	Maxim Blokh	This Russian gem is one of my favorite tactics books, though it can be a bit hard to find for us western folks. It contains ~1200 combinations meticulously sorted by tactical motif. Most positions are actually two problems in one, as it can be solved for one solution as white, and another solution for black. This is ideal for people setting up the position on an actual chess board, since you get almost twice the problems per time spent setting up positions. The difficulty level of each position is marked next to the problem (one for white and one for black). I like this feature as it lets me decide whether to just solve it while looking at the diagram or set things up on a board if it is considered difficult. Probably the most thoughtfully designed tactics book I have ever come across.
10	Endgame Strategy	M. I. Shereshevsky	When I was a kid, I loved endgames and picked up basically any endgame chess book I found at the used bookstore. This was probably my favorite. It concentrates on basic principles for how to play endgames, like when to exchange, king centralization, the two weakness principle, etc.. The examples are a bit messy and might be hard for a beginner to follow, but if you are an experienced player, but feel uncomfortable in endgames, this book is for you. Note, this review only addresses the original version, and I have not read the new expanded edition.
11	Chess: 5334 Problems, Combinations and Games	Laszlo Polgar	A giant tomb of mostly mate problems by papa Polgar (father to the famous Polgar sisters). There are 306 mate in ones, and over 3400 mate in two's, which get progressively harder. I have only done half the mate in two's and at that point I had been finding at least of the recent problems extremely challenging. It might not be the most efficient way to learn mating patterns, but if you enjoy sitting and solving for long periods of time, by the time you finish all the mate in twos you will have mastered the building blocks for all common mating patterns, most uncommon mating patterns, and have significantly improved board vision.
12	Chess Duels: My Games with the World Champions	Yasser Seirawan	Seirawan is an interesting guy. There was a time in my youth that it felt like he was the best player in the United States, but instead of competing he retired from professional chess and started what I consider the best chess magazine ever, Inside Chess. In this book he tells his story through his many encounters with Chess World champions, and the games and annotations are great. Possibly the games are not quite as interesting as if he was free to pick from a wider selection of games, but the stories are better. The book was an enjoyable read even if you don’t look at the games, but if you do I would consider My 60 Memorable Games a better book for the pure chess enjoyment of Fisher’s games. Example game:Seirawan - Smyslov
13	Garry Kasparov's Greatest Chess Games Volume 2	Igor Stohl	Igor presents a nice summary of each year of the 2nd half of Gary Kasparov's career, and presents 59 well annotated games. Kasparov's approach to chess is very dynamic and calculation intensive, two things that never appealed to me that much even as a youth. Still, I must admit his games can be very interesting and instructive. I have not looked at all the games, but the ones I have looked over have great annotations. Very detailed, but with good explanations instead of crazy computer lines. I do miss the missing games against Karpov, though, as the clash of styles between Karpov and Kasparov made for some of the most consistently interesting chess I have ever seen. Kasparov - Topalov Seven Deadly Chess Sins (14)
14	Seven Deadly Chess Sins	Jonathan Rowson	Rowson seems an erudite fellow, and as is common in such cases his book is full of a lot of nonsense with a few interesting thoughts sprinkled in. In some cases, it is pure philosophy with seemingly no point or conclusion. In other cases, he says something like “talk to your pieces” with no real definition, but enough examples that you eventually get the idea is “don’t let your pieces be bad.” I find the lack clarity and practicality of the message “talk to your pieces” compared to phrases like “when in doubt, take your worst piece and make it better” frustrating. Overall the book feels like you are taking a journey with the author through his personal process of discovery of how to play chess well, which is great if his process is intuitive for you, but to me it is not, and I much prefer books like The Road to Chess Improvement by Alex Yermolinsky that do the same thing in a way that feels much more intuitive. That said, an honest and earnest exploration of a strong player’s journey to chess understanding has real value, and this book is not useless. For example, his description of his thought process as he jumps back and forth between lines of analysis seems more real and instructive than more theoretical (and less realistic) descriptions of thought process such as in Think Like a Grandmaster by Kotov.
15	Improve Your Chess Results	Vladimir Zak	I don't find any of the advice in this book very compelling, but the games of strong young players combined with some insightful annotations gives this book value. There are definitely some games in this book that made a strong impression on young Cranky. Example game: Spassky - Avtonomov
16	Black to play and win with 1-g6: A complete defensive system	Andy Soltis	Many of the systems in this book are not objectively good, but I really enjoyed this book when it came out (1988), particularly the deliciously unintuitive elements of the Gurgenidze. I have seen modern players like Alireza Firouzja and Magnus Carlsen whipping out similar systems in blitz games, so it is clear understanding the type of systems and structures presented in this book is still relevant, even if the specific recommendations do not always stand-up to modern preparation. Example game: Lanka - Gipslis
17	Bobby Fischer rediscovered	Andrew Soltis	There are better Fischer books in terms of stories, and better Fischer books in terms of game annotations. Still, if you receive this book as a gift, you will enjoy paging through over a hundred fun Fischer games. Example game: Byrne - Fischer
18	New York International Chess Tournament 1984	Jeffrey Naier	My favorite aspect of this book is that my copy is signed by GM Edmar Mednis, who gifted it to me sometime after I had decided not to pursue chess seriously, but before I had stopped taking free gifts from the U.S. Chess Federation. It contains all the games from a tournament of strong masters, with a few annotated by one the players and most completely unannotated. Mednis believed going through all the games in a tournament gave you a feel for the competitive aspect of chess play that you could not pick up any other way. For example, you will see strong players blunder much more in this kind of book than a best games collection, which can be inspiring to young players trying to win titles and getting frustrated with their own mistakes. Example game: Larsen - Soltis

	Chess Game	Year	Rating	Enjoyment	Re-playability	Quality	Cultural Impact	Beginner	Intermediate	Advanced
1	Morphy Opera Game	1859	8.24	10	10	5.23	9.13	10	7	3
2	Bogoljubov - Alekhine	1922	7.18	8.5	9	6.93	2.00	6	8	9
3	Spassky - Fischer World Championship Game 6	1972	7.14	8	8.5	7.8	1	7	9	9
4	Kasparov - Topalov	1999	6.91	7.5	9	8.05	7.67	2	5	6
5	Byrne - Fischer	1956	6.44	5	6	7.85	9.20	6	6	6
6	Tal Botvinnik World Championship Game 1	1960	6.07	7	8	8.5	0	3	7	8
7	Morphy - Anderssen	1858	6.03	6.5	6	5.9	2.67	10	8	4
8	Fischer - Larsen	1958	6.00	7	8	8.5	0	5	8	8
9	Seirawan - Smyslov	1993	4.74	5	4	7.88	0	4	5	8
10	Spassky - Avtonomov	1949	4.50	6	4	6.85	0	7	4	2
11	Lanka - Gipslis	1984	3.99	5	2	7.9	0	2	5	5
12	Anderssen - Kleseritsky	1851	3.67	3.5	3.5	-0.15	7.00	3.5	5	4
13	Scheve - Teichmann	1907	3.46	4	2	5.53	0	8	4	1
14	Larsen - Soltis	1984	2.88	3	2	7.5	0	1	3	3