best book(s) for new player age 14

All Things Chess
1

Hi

Can anyone recommend the best book(s) for new player age 14?

2

An excellent and enjoyable book for the overall picture of Chess is “The Idiots Guide to Chess” by Patrick Wolff. This book contains info on history, culture, websites, top players, general improvement, books, etc. Also some basic instruction on the different phases of the game. This is the first book that I would read if I wanted to become familiar with the world of organized chess.

3

the play winning chess series by seirawan is good, stuff by pandolfini is good too

4

Having recently worked with some seventh-graders, most of whom knew the rules but not much more, I wholeheartedly recommend “Chess: Lessons From a Grandmaster” by Yury Shulman and Seth Rishi. Having developed a lot of bad habits early on and having to break myself of them now, I even found that book helpful for myself. You can only get it from Shulman’s website, but trust me, it’s worth it.

5

Susan Polgar has at least two books on tactics that are excellent. They have chapters based on tactical themes with an explanation and then problems to solve.

6

Apart from learning the mechanics of chess playing, reading books that give a feeling of what it is like to play and win - with all the ups and downs that occur in the course of a hard-fought game at any level - was both fun and inspiring for me when I started playing tournament chess at that age.

In my early days, I fell in love with two such books: Paul Morphy and the Golden Age of Chess by William Ewert Napier, and Epic Battles of the Chessboard, by R N Coles.

Today, I would recommend Rocking the Ramparts (A Giude to Attacking Chess) by Larry Christiansen.

There’s probably a bit of Walter Mitty in all of us, and these books first let me imagine going on to launching glorious attacks, slaying chessic dragons, and carrying home brilliancy prizes.

7

For a brand new player I would suggest the following:

  1. Your First Games of Chess, by A. J. Gilliam
  2. Chess for Tomorrow’s Champions, by John L. Walker

For a slightly more experienced player:

  1. Attacking the King, by John L. Walker
  2. The Genesis of Power Chess
  3. Logical Chess Move by Move, by Irving Chernev
  4. The Most Instructive Games of Chess Ever Played, by Irving Chernev

As a fourteen year old you should be able conceptually to handle some more heavyweight material. My first books were “Chess the Easy Way,” by Reuben Fine and “Lasker’s Manual of Chess”, by Emmanuel Lasker. These had many rules and examples, which is usually what a teenager is capable of handling because you are able to understand structure and reasoning by analogy. Younger kids should focus on tactics, tactics, tactics. More complex material is not “sticky” enough for the little ones.

As you progress, pick up puzzle books with tactical motifs, “My System”, by Aron Nimzovich, “Capablanca’s Best Chess Endings”, by Chernev, and whatever else appeals to the way you understand chess. We learn chess through a variety of ways. There is no one path that leads to mastery.

Tom Magar, National Master.