jekyllhydeclub reviewed on + 12 more book reviews
I am not entirely sure how an author who is
famous for his other books (Reassess your Chess)that can at least be useful to amateurs even if they do present many contrived situations where one side entirely dominates the board with a good strategic plan and creates an illusion of strategy which does not often occur in real life between equal, let alone differently rated opponents, at least the seeds provided can be applied with some discrimination.
Expecting something similar with my favorite opening,from a positional author, Jeremy Silman, who never holds back his criticism of the wrong plan from his students or even himself I honestly expected higher standards. Not because I wanted him to digest everything for me up to an endgame, I am a small B level and can do some plans quite admirably myself.
What I got was the other extreme. Succinct is a very polite words to describe my disappointment. Most variations didn't seem to have any finished games representing them, the crucial positions in the middlegame one could reach, as Nigel Davies would do, were not discussed in more detail, the diagrams were shown after a few moves. No plans of any kind, tactical or strategic, no warnings, no words of advice, no finished master games, no started amateur games.
The book never said that it was designed for masters specifically. I may be only a B level but I can follow a few tidbits here and there designed for those higher than myself, up to an Expert level. I could not find anything in the book I could use. If any of you masters out there like it, you must have some perverse tastes in your chess literature.
I simply don't understand how this book is a book on openings. It may have a brief tactical introduction, but I would not need the book for that even as a D level, and if some strategy was somehow implied in later sections, I must have failed to notice it in my density.
I have never seen as bad of an opening book as the Accelerated Dragons by Silman and Donaldson. I used to respect both authors and so still cannot process how they agree to put their name to such rubbish that keeps getting reprinted.
Silman himself often says that you have to have a passion for the opening you play. I do have it for the Dragon but if I didn't, the book would certainly not encourage it.
If you are a Dragon player, if you are below my B level and want to learn some new tricks, please do yourself a favor and steer clear of it. Yes, I know, it is a Silman, but it may as well have been written by a different author who believes in none of the concepts that made the IM Jeremy Silman so famous.
This advice is not intended for Experts and Masters, I am below your level and cannot recommend anything,I only hope that some of you can glean the nuggets of wisdom I missed and post them in a clear way out there so that I can learn and not feel like I wasted money.
Maybe this book should have been called Dragon Slayer, because reading it was initially devastating for me, never have I experienced such a strong desire to throw a Chess Book away. In fact I could not handle having it in my sight much longer and felt forced to simply give it away in trade with the hope that somebody else can get the benefit I would not.
Only a DVD by GM Eugene Pereleshteyn and a few Youtube videos restored my faith in the opening and even to this day I don't play it as often as I could because of my disgust with Accelerated Dragons by Silman.
famous for his other books (Reassess your Chess)that can at least be useful to amateurs even if they do present many contrived situations where one side entirely dominates the board with a good strategic plan and creates an illusion of strategy which does not often occur in real life between equal, let alone differently rated opponents, at least the seeds provided can be applied with some discrimination.
Expecting something similar with my favorite opening,from a positional author, Jeremy Silman, who never holds back his criticism of the wrong plan from his students or even himself I honestly expected higher standards. Not because I wanted him to digest everything for me up to an endgame, I am a small B level and can do some plans quite admirably myself.
What I got was the other extreme. Succinct is a very polite words to describe my disappointment. Most variations didn't seem to have any finished games representing them, the crucial positions in the middlegame one could reach, as Nigel Davies would do, were not discussed in more detail, the diagrams were shown after a few moves. No plans of any kind, tactical or strategic, no warnings, no words of advice, no finished master games, no started amateur games.
The book never said that it was designed for masters specifically. I may be only a B level but I can follow a few tidbits here and there designed for those higher than myself, up to an Expert level. I could not find anything in the book I could use. If any of you masters out there like it, you must have some perverse tastes in your chess literature.
I simply don't understand how this book is a book on openings. It may have a brief tactical introduction, but I would not need the book for that even as a D level, and if some strategy was somehow implied in later sections, I must have failed to notice it in my density.
I have never seen as bad of an opening book as the Accelerated Dragons by Silman and Donaldson. I used to respect both authors and so still cannot process how they agree to put their name to such rubbish that keeps getting reprinted.
Silman himself often says that you have to have a passion for the opening you play. I do have it for the Dragon but if I didn't, the book would certainly not encourage it.
If you are a Dragon player, if you are below my B level and want to learn some new tricks, please do yourself a favor and steer clear of it. Yes, I know, it is a Silman, but it may as well have been written by a different author who believes in none of the concepts that made the IM Jeremy Silman so famous.
This advice is not intended for Experts and Masters, I am below your level and cannot recommend anything,I only hope that some of you can glean the nuggets of wisdom I missed and post them in a clear way out there so that I can learn and not feel like I wasted money.
Maybe this book should have been called Dragon Slayer, because reading it was initially devastating for me, never have I experienced such a strong desire to throw a Chess Book away. In fact I could not handle having it in my sight much longer and felt forced to simply give it away in trade with the hope that somebody else can get the benefit I would not.
Only a DVD by GM Eugene Pereleshteyn and a few Youtube videos restored my faith in the opening and even to this day I don't play it as often as I could because of my disgust with Accelerated Dragons by Silman.
