Books: Play Winning Chess

Almost every chess player has a story about how they first started playing the game. My first real memories of competitive chess are the skirmishes I used to fight with my cousin, who is ten years my senior. Needless to say, these were tough battles; I was no chess prodigy, and my cousin had much more experience and guile. In fact, I can't even remember checkmating him once.

"Play Winning Chess," by FIDE grandmaster Yasser Seirawan and international master Jeremy Silman, was my attempt to get an upper hand in our constant battles. It's a fairly thorough overview of the game, complete with historical information about the development of chess. Seirawan even gives some profiles of famous masters, like Tigran Petrosian and Dawid Janowski.

Of course, that stuff is all preamble to the real meat here: a solid introduction to chess strategy. Seirawan separates chess into four basic principles - force, time, space, and pawn structure. By having a sense of the condition of all these principles during a game, you're more likely to focus on a winning strategy. Of course, there's a lot more to chess than that (and Seirawan does partially address the nitty-gritty parts like endgame positioning), but it's nice to see a beginner's book that's approachable.