100 Endgames You Must Know: Vital Lessons for Every Chess Player Improved and Expanded

I had heard that this is the definitive book on the endgame but was surprised how readable it is. A must for any serious chess player.

These are great products!!

This is an excellent introduction to the study of Endgames. After reading this, you'll find that other deeper endgame books are easier to understand.

Excellent endgame text. Still working through it but learned a lot so far.

Just great

Very instructive book. Buy it!

Terrific!

First, let me say that I am enjoying the content of Mr de la Villa's book. I am familiar with much of the theory already, having studied the works of Averbakh, Dvoretsky and a number of other authors. This book's approach is more focused on prioritizing the study time, and on drawing out the _conceptual ideas_ behind the winning and drawing techniques that are essential to understand in these endgames. There are very few extremely rare and obscure positions that de la Villa introduces, although there are a few which he justifies by explaining that it is not important to learn how to handle these positions themselves, by observing how they should be handled, more general techniques and ideas can be taught. I find this hard to accept, since if a technique that appears in these obscure endings can be described as having more general use, then by definition there should be other, more common, types of positions in which it also appears. If that's the case, why not just demonstrate the handling of the more common position and kill two birds with one stone? But without doing laborious research to find the corresponding more common positions, I can't expect to refute his claim that these positions are uniquely valuable. If I stumble across some, I will post an update. I have only a few complaints about the content of this book. I consider them significant (your mileage may vary), because they affect how well I can interpret and apply de la Villa's instruction. If I do these things poorly as a result of these complaints, it may end up costing me a prize in a tournament that is worth much more than the book itself. *Contradictory Guidance* In Ending 45, Position 9.11, de la Villa states, "A typical feature of opposite-coloured bishops is that the result does not depend on tempi." That is, even if both sides take as many moves as they want to maneuver, the outcome is a foregone conclusion as long as no one makes a stupid mistake. However, in Ending 43, Position 9.7, also an example of opposite-colored bishops, de la Villa states: "…the black pieces are ill-placed and have no time (actually, they lack one tempo) to reach the ideal defensive set-up…" I.e., Black cannot save the draw, and will lose, although with another tempo (i.e. a spare move) he would draw. In other words, in at least one type of opposite-colored bishops ending, the result _does_ depend on tempi. This obviously directly _contradicts_ the guidance given in the prior example. What are we to make of this guidance? "Time doesn't matter in this type of ending, except when it does?" There's no reliable way to interpret this guidance in a useful way. *Imprecise Language* In the previous example, one might assume that by "typical feature", de la Villa means something like, "in the majority of cases", or "general", but not "universal". That's the only way that his first statement could be reconciled with his second. But the word "typical", by its very definition, _means_ "characteristic", or "distinctive", i.e. _defining_ the type, and this directly implies _universal_ at the same time. It is an _absolute_ (all-or-nothing) term. If an object lacks a typical feature of a class, then it, by definition, does not belong to that class. He (or his translator) is simply misusing the word "typical". In casual usage, this wouldn't be a problem, but in an educational setting, it's misleading, confusing and frustrating. It's either a rule, or it isn't. If it's a rule with exceptions, then they have to be enumerated (i.e. comprehensively, uniquely, and specifically identified). I took his meaning to be "most of the time", but it's not clear what the remaining exceptions are, or if the one given is the only one. The main content of this review deals with how the Kindle edition fails to deliver the content in a user-friendly and easily-readable manner. And that, unfortunately, is a deal-breaker. *Diagram (Un)readability* In every aspect of chess except openings, chess diagrams are the keystones on which chess education is founded. Their readability is crucial to the success of a chess publication. The use of obscure piece fonts, jarring or distracting area fills for dark squares, and excessively ornate borders, etc. all serve to undermine the purpose of the diagram, which is to communicate a _real_ position on a _real_ board. It is symbolic, and symbolic only. Size is another area in which diagrams can fail, and this is the case in this Kindle edition. The boards in the chess position diagrams in the Kindle edition are shown using only 1/4 of the available width of the display area. On an average cellphone with a normal size of screen (mine is a Samsung Galaxy S4, with a normally-totally-adequate 5" screen), this renders the characters depicting the pieces in a typeface that is _smaller than 8 pt_. In fact, this size font is _smaller than the minimum size of typeface_ that the Kindle reader allows for text. In other words, even the _Kindle_ designers think this font size is unreadable. If I'm trying to read the ebook while traveling, on a typical cellphone screen, I have to hold the screen within a foot of my face to distinguish the pieces, and even then I have to peer at the pawns and bishops to distinguish them. I have perfectly adequate vision, so this is not caused by my eyesight. What's worse, the diagrams *_cannot_* be zoomed by dragging, rotating the phone or resizing the text using the Kindle font size tools. There is absolutely no good reason to publish the diagrams at this size; on _any_ platform they could be as much as _4 times larger_ and they would still fit the screen, with _room to spare_ for text at the bottom or one side. Also, this is _not_ a problem that is universal to all chess ebooks on the Kindle platform; I have a number of chess e-books, and this is one of the rare few with this diagram-size problem. Most have perfectly adequate, near-screen-width diagrams, which are easy to read when you have to resort to a low screen brightness setting (to conserve battery power), you are in a shaking subway car, or when your eyes are just tired. This ebook is completely unusable in those conditions, and hard to use in all others. *Unconventional and Confusing Use of Typesetting for Moves* The moves in the main line and in the variations are of different fonts and font sizes, as they should be, to help the reader locate the main line and to distinguish the variations from it. However, the convention used in all of the other ebooks (and books) I've ever seen is to set the main line moves in a _larger_ font size, and if bold typeface is used, only to apply it to main line moves to simplify the task of returning to the main line after examining a variation. Unfortunately, this convention is completely reversed in this Kindle edition; the main line moves are _smaller_ font than those in the variations, and when bold font is used, it is _only_ used in the first moves of _some_ variations. For example, in Ending 1, Position 1.6, variations are first introduced. If the font size of the main line moves is set to 11 in the Kindle font size tools, then the font size of the _variation_ moves will be 12 (i.e. larger, rather than smaller). Since it is the _main line_ which illustrates the most important ideas, this application of typesetting technique is counterintuitive and counterproductive. The correct use of differentiated font sizing is ably demonstrated in all document headings that have a hierarchy; refer to any textbook for an example. The more important, the bigger. It's that simple. Why would anyone decide to shrink the font of the mainline moves to a type size smaller than the variations? In fact to a size that is actually _smaller than the ebook's narrative text_?? The space savings must be minimal (no more than 5%, if that), so the only thing that this approach reliably accomplishes is simply _degrading the readability of the Kindle edition_. To illustrate the problem in the use of bold typeface: In Ending 1, Position 1.10, bold font is introduced, and highlights the first move of a variation. However, it _only_ appears when there are _multiple variation branches_ occurring at the same move number, and _only for the first move of a variation that differs from the main line_. Subordinate variation branches (variations within a variation) have no bolding whatsoever. Again, the variation font size is larger than the main line. This has the effect of making the first moves of multiple variations that deviate from the main line stand out in the text, and by contrast, _obscuring_ the main line moves with two typesetting techniques, and the remaining variation moves and branches with one. To make matters worse, this counterproductive convention is also inconsistently applied. In Ending 42, Position 9.4, the first move of the _only_ variation branch off of the main line for White's first move is in bold. However, there are no additional variation branches from the main line at the same move, so bolding should not occur here. A half-move later, when providing a single variation for _Black's first move_ in reply, there is no bolding on the first move! All of this confusing typesetting makes following the moves difficult. Reading the book will become much more enjoyable when it is published in a _playable_ format, such as ChessBase (CBH) or Portable Game Notation (PGN), where the font sizes are, by default, either constant or left to the reader to alter. I've gotten so frustrated with this Kindle edition that I've actually started converting the endgames I'm interested in studying into a playable format. I would really rather have spent the conversion time doing some actual studying. In the meantime, the current Kindle edition resembles a slap-dash, automated conversion of the original print edition, with poor typesetting conventions, inadequate proofreading, and a severe lack of appreciation of how chess books are read, and how effective typesetting in a chess book works, and should look, and has successfully looked for years. The typesetting, in my opinion, represents a real step backwards in chess publishing. On the typesetting of the Kindle edition itself, I award a D-. The only reason it doesn't get an _F_ is because the diagrams are actually readable on my large LCD monitor, and only there. I would advise waiting until the Kindle edition of this work is repaired before purchasing this work in Kindle format.

Having returned to Chess after a 20 year absence I needed a comprehensive Endgame book which would cover all common endings. I had already bought John Emms' excellent book on Rook Endings so I needed something to cover the rest. I initially purchased Dvoresky's book on chess endings which, though comprehensive, was much too detailed for me (about 1400). This book is pitched at just the right level - detailed enough to include every type of endgame the average player is likely to encounter but clear enough to show the right method not just the right moves. My search for an endgame book is now over.

The book mainly looks at the theoretical endgames where there are mainly less than 6 pieces on board. I do not recollect a single position with 7 or more pieces. THIS BOOK SHOULD BE MASTERED BEFORE TOUCHING MULTI PIECE ENDINGS

A useful book for lessons with chess students. I already have the paperback version but like to carry this around on my tablet and hence the purchase of the kindle version.

The thing I enjoyed most in this book is the way it presents the win/draw methods. It shows the method applied to one simpler (or main) position, and after this he tries to apply the same method in positions slightly modified from the first one, thus getting the reader to understand the differences and the exceptions to the rules. To me it is a new and easier way to learn important theoretical endings, and it is also a lot of fun, specially when compared to the "normal"ending books that I know.

Very good book. All players should have it