Winning Chess Tactics for Juniors
by Lou Hays
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Book Summary Information
Author: Lou HaysEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1994-11-01
ISBN: 1880673932
Number of pages: 128
Publisher: Hays Publishing
Book Reviews of Winning Chess Tactics for Juniors
Book Review: Don't Underestimate this book
Summary: 5 Stars
I have been attempting to build up my chess tactics for sometime now, and I've examined several of the basic tactics books out there. There are several books that discuss tactics, for example, explaining what a pin is, what a fork is, yadda yadda yadda, and yet those "basic" books (i.e. Beginning Chess Players Bible, for example) don't really have many practice problems. Sierwan's popular book "Winning Chess Tactics" had a similar problem for me.
From there you have hard-hitting, heavy books on tactics that were simply too advanced for me. Combination Challenge was one of those books, too complicated for me at times, too difficult. It took me a long time to find that kind middle-ground books for relative beginners trying to work on their tactics.
In the end, I've been working out of two main puzzle books to practice my tactics: Polgar's monstrous CHESS (5355ish problems...) and then this little gem of a book. When I discuss Winning Chess Tactics for Juniors, understand then that I've seen a few of the harder books but the other book I've mostly worked with is Polgar.
For starters, Winning Chess Tactics for Juniors is a derivative work. Hays took some problems from Combination Challenge and put them together in this book. For me, that's not a complaint because the full fledged CC was too difficult for me. One immediate plus when I got this book was that it is TINY. Tiny is not a bad thing -- it's fantastic! 128 pages of mostly diagrams is a solid chunk of problems, and it fits anywhere!
I admit, I was concerned how long it would take to get through the book. I've plowed through about 700 of Polgar's problems in only a few weeks, so I was concerned that Winning Chess Tactics would be silly.
No. Don't let "For Juniors" fool you. For beginners, this book will kick your face in. It is an EXCELLENT tactical workout. There's a few reasons for this. For one, the diagrams are relatively complicated, so you have to consider a variety of potential moves. Secondly, you are only given the clue of who's turn it is to move. That means you might be winning a piece with a tactical strike, or you may be playing for mate. The only clue aside from who's turn it is would be the section grouping (i.e. "discovered attacks" section will contain many variations of a discovered check, discovered attack, double dhecks, etc).
This lack of hints makes it an extremely useful workout. In Polgar, and several other books I looked at, you're given "White to play, Mate in 3", or "Find the Fork", etc. That kind of mental prompting is very nice, actually, but in some ways it is illusory. During a game you will not know there is mate in two, unless you yourself can SEE, in fact, there is a threat of mate in two. Winning Chess Tactics for Juniors is an excellent book because it makes a much more realistic simulation of what you might find glancing at the board in your own games.
Out of the puzzle books I've worked with (Sierwan's being the other prominent one), this book strikes a nice balance of difficulty and variety, and it's format makes it very useful. Though this is technically a derivative product, it is a very useful product and the fact that it is derivative doesn't really matter to me. If you're advanced enough to be taking on the full Combination Challenge, of course, you don't want this book, but if you're relatively new to club / tournament chess and you want to practice your tactics, I highly recommend this book.
Summary of Winning Chess Tactics for Juniors
This book is an easier version of Combination Challenge!, also by Lou Hays. It contains 535 one- two- and three-move combinations to solve and teaches a study method for learning to play combinative chess. This is the quickest and easiest way to improve your chess rapidly.Games Books
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