Brætspil

Andrew Soltis covers the unparalleled career of acclaimed American chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer with fresh insights into what made Fischer play - and act - the way he did.

A quirky but useful exploration of the qualities chess masters have that you don't, and how to acquire them.

The standard reference work on chess openings for more than half a century, earning the epithet 'the chess player's bible'. 'Batsford's Modern Chess Openings' is the most comprehensive single-volume work on the openings. Covering every standard line of play, it provides the distilled essence of contemporary opening theory. This edition is an indispensable reference work for club and tournament players.International Grandmaster Nick de Firmian is a three-times US Champion and an expert on opening theory. He helped develop computer Deeper Blue's opening repertoire in its match victory over arch-theoretician Gary Kasparov.

'The most famous chess match of all time reconstructed in a style as compelling as that of a thriller.'Irish TimesFor decades, the USSR had dominated world chess. Evidence, according to Moscow, of the superiority of the Soviet system. But in 1972 along came the American, Bobby Fischer: insolent, arrogant, abusive, vain, greedy, vulgar, bigoted, paranoid and obsessive - and apparently unstoppable.Against him was Boris Spassky: complex, sensitive, the most un-Soviet of champions. As the authors reveal, when Spassky began to lose, the KGB decided to step in . . .'The authors build to a crescendo with fascinating details, taking the reader inside the two camps in Reykjavik . . . General readers will savor a marvelous portrait of East against West, with perceived societal superiority as the real prize.' Kirkus Reviews'Pure drama . . . The most cool, ruthless and rational player the world has ever seen.' Independent'Fischer seemed to thrive on complaints, tantrums and ultimatums, treating the exercise as a game, not of chess but of Chicken . . . It is precisely these factors that make for such a gripping read.' Sunday Times

This book brings together the two greatest names in the history of chess. The author, Garry Kasparov, is the world number one and, by common consent, the greatest player ever. The subject of the book, Bobby Fischer, is the only American to have become world champion and is probably the greatest natural talent the world has ever seen.In the period between 1955 and 1972 Fischer, more or less single-handedly, took on the might of the Soviet Chess Empire, and won. During this time Fischer scored astonishing successes the like of which had not been seen before. These included 11/11 in the 1963/64 US Championship and match victories (en route to the World Championship) by the score of 6-0 against two of the strongest players in the world, Mark Taimanov and Bent Larsen. The climax of Fischer's campaign was his unforgettable match win in Reykjavik in 1972 against Boris Spassky. Fischer is almost equally well-known for his temperamental behaviour away from the board, as his play on it. He made extreme demands of all those around him including tournament organisers. When these demands were not met he often refused to play. The 1972 match against Spassky required the intervention of no less than Henry Kissinger to smooth things over. In 1975 when he was due to defend his title against Anatoly Karpov, Fischer was completely unable to agree terms with FIDE (the World Chess Federation) and was defaulted. After this he more or less gave up chess, playing only once, a 'return' match against Spassky in 1992. In this book, a must for all serious chessplayers, Kasparov analyses deeply Fischer's greatest games and assesses the legacy of this great American genius.

Improve your RPG campaign with this comprehensive and interactive guide to making the most out of your gaming experience.

Tabletop and board games aren't just for rainy days or awkward family events anymore.

Vladimir Kramnik held the title of Classical World Chess Champion from 2000 to 2007. This book tells the remarkable story of Kramnik's top-level clashes, while providing an exciting view behind the scenes of the chess world. Added to this are Kramnik's own comments on some of his most memorable games, as well as numerous colour photographs.

Three classic titles from the Everyman Chess Starting Out Series in one volume. Starting Out: Queen's Gambit Accepted by Alexander Raetsky and Maxim Chetverik Starting Out: Queen's Gambit Declined by Neil McDonald Starting: Slav Semi Slav by Glenn Flear

A chess combination involves a sacrifice upsetting the balance of forces, but will it work or tragically boomerang? In Winning Chess Combinations the reader is invited to solve this question by identifying the advantages that a specific position holds which might make the combination successful.

Match the cats and kittens of 25 breeds from around the world in this beautifully illustrated memory game.

Grandmaster and renowned chess teacher Johan Hellsten provides an essential foundation of opening strategy and an abundance of carefully selected exercises so that readers can monitor their progress.

The legendary Mikhail Tal was the finest ever exponent of attacking chess. His all-out sacrificial style took him all the way to the World Championship title. Dogged by ill-health, Tal's reign was a short one, and he was never able to regain his crown, but Tal remained an outstanding player right up to his death in 1992. His departure has taken away one of the chess world's most charismatic figures; a player who excited chess passions wherever he went. In this, his last book, written together with Russian sports journalist Iakov Damsky, Tal shows how to unleash devastating attacks in all kinds of positions.

Investigates the different strategies and tactics in the Italian Game and Evans Gambit. Using model games for both White and Black, this book provides coverage of both the main lines and offbeat variations, and seeks to arm the reader with enough knowledge to play the Italian Game and Evans Gambit with confidence.

The Modern Benoni arises after 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5 3.d5 e6. It leads to unbalanced structures and exciting play, so it has naturally been a favourite of ambitious attacking players such as Tal, Fischer and, more recently, Topalov, Ivanchuk and Gashimov. The Modern Benoni is a bold answer to 1.d4 and GM Marian Petrov shows it is possible to play this line confidently without memorizing extreme levels of theory. Black must certainly be well prepared, but the workload is less than for most aggressive defences - this book supplies all Black needs to know.

The three-times World Chess Solving Champion distils the most useful middlegame concepts and knowledge into 100 lessons that everyone can understand.Following on from his successful Understanding Chess Endgames, John Nunn turns his attention to the middlegame - the phase of the chess battle where most games are decided, yet the one that has received the least systematic treatment from chess writers. With the outstanding clarity for which he is famous, Nunn breaks down complex problems into bite-sized pieces.In the case of attacking play, we are shown how to decide where to attack, and the specific methods that can be used to pursue the enemy king. Positional play is described in terms of the major structural issues, and how the pieces work around and with the pawns. Nunn explains how to assess when certain pieces are better than others, and how we can make use of this understanding at the board. Readers will never be short of a plan, whatever type of position arises.Each lesson features two inspiring examples from modern chess, annotated honestly and with a keen focus on the main instructive points. Both sides' ideas are emphasized, so we get a clear picture of the ways to disrupt typical plans as well as how to form them.

A comprehensive update on her popular 2007 book Play the Caro-Kann and focuses on key new developments since then.

Since he arrived on the chess scene in 1992 at the age of 16, Vladimir Kramnik has been tipped as a future World Chamption. Here, he annotates 100 of his best games, and talks about his life and unusual childhood.

Gives you tips and techniques for analyzing openings and strategies for winning chess games from the very first move you make. This guide provides you with instructions on the opening chess strategies and gives you the tools you need to develop your own line of attack from the very start.

Jose Capablanca's classic instructional manual 'Chess Fundamentals' first appeared in 1921, the year he defeated Emanuel Lasker for the world championship title. This handbook is packed with timeless advice on different aspects of practical play and illustrated by Capablanca's own games. Topics covered include first principles, planning, the initiative, endgame strategy, and much more. After capturing the world championship, Jose Capablanca was for a time regarded as practically invincible. However, after his upset defeat by Alexander Alekhine in 1927, Capablanca was never able to obtain a revenge match for the world title, though he remained one of the leading players during the 1930s. (5 2/4' X 8 1/4', 121 pages, illustrations)

How games create beauty and meaning, and how we can use them to explore the aesthetics of thought.Are games art? This question is a dominant mode of thinking about games and play in the twenty-first century, but it is fundamentally the wrong question. Instead, Frank Lantz proposes in his provocative new book, The Beauty of Games, that we think about games and how they create meaning through the lens of the aesthetic. We should think of games, he writes, the same way we think about literature, theater, or music—as a form that ranges from deep and profound to easy and disposable, and everything in between. Games are the aesthetic form of interactive systems, a set of possibilities connected by rules of cause and effect.In this book, Lantz analyzes games from chess to poker to tennis to understand how games create beauty and evoke a deeper meaning. He suggests that we think of games not only as hyper-modern objects but also as forms within the ancient context of artistic production, encompassing all of the nebulous and ephemeral qualities of the aesthetic experience.

Divine your destiny with the Pathfinder Harrow Deck, the legendary fortune-telling cards of Pathfinder's Age of Lost Omens setting! With this 54-card, full-color set of fortune-telling cards, you'll learn how to include the harrow in any tabletop RPG game and enhance play with immersive fortune-telling methods and other insights. With vivid all-new art, exciting printing treatments, patterned backing, and a size common to many real-world tarot decks, the Harrow Deck straddles the line between game supplement and storytelling set piece. Also included is a small booklet that provides details on the history of the harrow, how to simulate fortune-telling readings for your group, and details on the meanings and roles of all 54 cards in the collection! Next time your players encounter a fortune teller at the carnival or a sooth-sayer at the local tavern, don't just tell them their future--show it to them with the Pathfinder Harrow Deck!