Description
Three well known chess opening experts get together to take a revolutionary look at Flank Openings. They concentrate on fresh or little explored variations, selecting a wealth of dangerous options for both colours.
An online reviewer wrote ” In this work, the three authors compile individual and separate articles of between ten and thirty pages in length detailing the weapon under consideration. There are twelve chapters and therefore twelve weapons under review.
Without outlining every chapter, Ill note that eight of the chapters concern English Opening positions arising from the Reti with Nf3 d5 2 c4; and the last two chapters give us ideas after 1 f4 with the final chapter being named Beware the Polar Bear after 1 f4 d5 2 Nf3 g6 3 g3 Bg7 4 Bg2. Seven of the chapters lay out ideas for White and five do the same for Black. This provides a nice balance, with the weapons appearing as early as move three or as late as move eight. Each chapter introduces the weapon with an oversized diagram of the starting position and an overview of whats to come.
Typically, the main line game follows where the dangerous weapon works to perfection or at least was successful from the opening phase. These games are annotated with references to major alternative moves. Finally, the chapters conclude with the Looking a Little Deeper section where the theory of the variation in question is analysed. Each variation and chapter is separate and distinct; no attempt is made to develop a complete repertoire for either side.
There is no doubt that this series makes the study of openings more interesting and exciting. Players adopting these weapons know the premise going in and have to combine some memorization and the ability to project into murky tactical situations where best play may be elusive. I don’t think players can develop an entire repertoire around dangerous weapons only, but I do think there is fertile ground for pulling off quick wins and certainly the ability to strengthen your tactical skills at the earliest point in the game.
The authors do an outstanding job of combining home analysis with existing theory and show us where we might look for improvements. I am equally impressed with the editing and compilation of all the chapters as the synthesis of the three authors articles is consistent in terms of explanation, depth of analysis, and strikes the right balance between analysis and theory.
Softback 256 pages. Dimensions 152 x 229 x 13.97mm
