Recommend chess puzzles.

[Ian Paternoster]

Can anyone recommend a chess puzzle book. I enjoy doing chess puzzles, yet I cannot seem to get them in book form. Thank you in advance.

[MJMcCready]

Julian Hodgson - The chess travellers Quiz Book. Very good.

[Ian Paternoster]

I see that all their books are out of print.

[Richard James]

https://chessforheroes.uk/purchase/

You might want to look at some of these books.

[Nick Burrows]

This is a classic. It's an enormous door stop of a book with 5000+ problems. Mainly mate in 2's and 3's, many of which are deceptively hard. Very useful for drilling/hardwiring all of the possible mating patterns into your brain.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Chess-5334-Pro ... 1579125549

A very different type of problem set to the usual books of practical game positions.

Another classic is the set by Maksim Bloch. Each puzzle has a difficulty rating, which i like. Good quality puzzles:

https://chess.co.uk/products/600-combin ... ksim-blokh

[Joey Stewart]

Nick has really hit the nail on the head with that polgar book - it is so well composed for the purposes of actually getting better as a player rather then looking for obscure zugzwang moves like you see in most of the crazy mate in two compositions (not that these are useless, as they are good for practising board visualisation, even if they serve little practical means in games)
Ironically enough, as engine technology has improved it is the older puzzle books that are still the best as any idiot can tell an engine to spew out a bunch of positions with all sorts of branching variations that only win an exchange at best but it takes real talent and effort to produce puzzles that have concise and satisfying solutions.

[Geoff Chandler]

Any book of puzzles usually does the job, but if I had to recommend one then this;



Do not be put off by the cover, it's not a kids book. I've had copy now for 15 years and still not finished it.

This is in there. White to play and draw.

8/6p1/Pkp3P1/4p1PK/4p3/3pP1P1/1p1P3P/8 w - - 0 1

How easy it that. Force Black to take the a-pawn. Then the old g4 and h4 King boxed in stalemate trick. I was wrong!

[FEN "8/6p1/Pkp3P1/4p1PK/4p3/3pP1P1/1p1P3P/8 w - - 0 1"] 1. a7 Kxa7 2. g4 b1=Q 3. h4 {And Black cannot give White a move so it is Stalemate. Easy. Yes but what happens if Black takes a Knight on move 2 and plays 3....Nc3. Then the stalemate has been lifted. Good Luck.}

[Ian Paternoster]

Thank you for the recommendations.

[Geoff Chandler]

N. Kralin composed that study. It beat me, I fell into the 'hooray an easy one trap.' by just glancing at the diagram. I should have known there was more to it. Some positions have been chosen to trip you up. Positions from well known games that have been tweaked (changed whose move it was or added/removed a pawn etc..) to catch long term solvers who can remember what to play rather than work it out.

[FEN "8/6p1/Pkp3P1/4p1PK/4p3/3pP1P1/1p1P3P/8 w - - 0 1"] 1. a7 Kxa7 2. g4 {Taking a Queen allows the draw so....} 2... b1=N 3. h3 {Not 3.h4 this move forces Black to make a move with his King.} 3... Nc3 4. h4 {Black cannot move his Knight as it's stalemate so the King as to move.} 4... Kb7 {Going to a8, b8 or b6 will allow White to promote with a check. For 4. Ka6 see the note after Black’s 9th move.} 5. dxc3 d2 6. c4 d1=Q 7. c5 {Black needs once again to give White a move.} 7... Qd4 8. exd4 e3 9. d5 e2 {10. dxc3+ Kc8. 11.c7 e8=Q 12.c6 Qxh4+ and Black wins the c-pawns and the ending. If here the Black King was on a6 then 10.dxc3 is OK as White will promote with a check.} 10. d6 {Promoting to a Queen will not work here. White will promote to a Queen and Black will have to take it making a stalemate.} 10... e1=N 11. d7 Nd3 {Black is now threatening 12...Nf4 checkmate.} 12. d8=N+ {CHECK! the idea of h2-h3-h4 forcing the King to move b7 is now clear.} 12... Ka6 13. Ne6 {Suddenly White is threatening to win with 14. Nxg7 which gives the White King h6 to run to and the g6 pawn will win the game.} 13... Nf4+ {Black had no choice. He cannot allow Nxg7.} 14. Nxf4 exf4 {Stalemate. Brilliant. The time that must have taken to work out getting the sequence of moves just right is amazing. A wonderful piece of work.}

[Ian Paternoster]

I got myself the Polgar book. That will keep me going for some time. Thank you.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Coming back to the one Geoff recommended:

https://slavchess.com/en/products/chess ... der-mazia/

It is by the publisher Russian Chess House, which may not be that well known to English-language chess players.

The ability to calculate variations quickly and deeply is an inherent quality of a strong chess player. The best way of Acquiring this skill is by systematic, purposeful training. From many years of experience in teaching young players and observing the successful work of trainers, it has been found that an essential training exercise for improvement in the calculation of variations is the solving of specially selected positions. The third volume in the Chess School series is geared for more advanced players. 750 positions are given, grouped by category: Accurate calculation of short variations Lengthy forcing calculation Rational choice of candidate moves Finding strong moves during calculation Taking account of the opponents resources Searching for unusual solutions Complicated calculation Solutions The instructions are in English, Spanish, German and Russian.

I have come across a number of these chess combination books that are multi-lingual (here, four languages!).

They tend to be good (as Geoff has said for this one). There are also some that eschew text and use symbols to indicate types of positions and so on, presumably catering to all languages, or, to be 'romantic', the language of chess!

[Geoff Chandler]

As I said, any book of puzzles will do. I always had my nose in one. Barden, Alexander, Mansfield or Reinfeld.
CHESS magazine gives you about 30 each month. I do not like solving online puzzles, however, if you start out that way I can see the benefit because often you are given the 'moving' solution without having to set up it up on the board.
Though I still believe you have to see it in 3d to be able to see it OTB (pattern recognition ) without a doubt some kids these days are transferring knowledge picked up on a screen to the chessboard no problem at all.

[David Shepherd]

Endgame Challenge John Hall
Combination Challenge John Hall & Lou Hayes