BOOK REVIEW by Carl Portman
BEGINNER CHESS PUZZLES
500 Practice exercises to take
your
game to the next level.
by Martin Bennedik
Martin Bennedik
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
2024 - 1st edition (Softcover, 256 pages)
What is this book about?
The
blurb states:
Build new chess skills and practice key tactics with
these 500 entertaining, beginner chess exercises so you can improve your game.
For new chess enthusiasts who are eager to practice and grow their skills, Beginner Chess Puzzles has hundreds of
puzzles to up your game!
500 puzzles take you through all the tactical motifs that beginners need to
know—the fundamentals (including capturing and defending pieces), tactics
(forks, pins, and skewers, discovered attacks and checks, and removing the
defense), and checkmate patterns. Including the basic instructions for how to
solve chess puzzles, Beginner Chess Puzzles is packed with clear and detailed explanations of each key tactical
motif and pattern with puzzles to practice each.
As players advance through the lessons, they’ll gain confidence as puzzles
gradually increase in difficulty. “Workout” sections throughout include puzzles
that practice any of the skills learned up to that point; without additional
information, players must detect which motifs need to be deployed—much like in
an actual chess game.
Clear chessboard diagrams allow players to picture every puzzle, and the
detailed answer key carefully explains how to get to the best solution.
Allowing new players to improve skills on their own, offline, and in a
take-anywhere format, Beginner Chess
Puzzles is the perfect gift for chess fanatics of any age.
Contents
·
Introduction
·
How
to use this book
·
Lessons
1-12
·
Puzzle
Solutions
Look and feel of the book
The
cover is of good quality and not too flimsy for a soft cover. Certainly it is good
enough to take a lot of thumbing from a keen chess student, or indeed a chess
coach/teacher. The book is an appreciable size, the font is large and clear and the
diagrams are of excellent quality and very well laid out. I can have no complaints.
My thoughts and comments
The
question I always ask myself is ‘does the world need another chess puzzle
book?' There are countless of these on the market so does this one stand out,
will beginners benefit and is it worth spending hard-earned cash on? I have
taken time to go through the book, trying to do so through the eyes of someone
who knows the moves and the rules of chess and ready to embark upon the great
journey. There will be tactics, checkmate patters discovered attacks and
defender removal abound, as well as other key points.
500
puzzles is plenty to get your teeth into. Let me give three examples, since the
author notes that puzzles begin easy and get progressively more difficult
throughout the book – but never in my view beyond reach of the disciplined
beginner who goes through the puzzles diligently.
This
is the first position in the book and it says White to win (from
Arushi-Punsalan, New Delhi 2019).
One
would hope that the beginner would easily find 1.Bxh8 winning material. This is a nice warm up. I would say to the beginner after solving this that it is White
to win material - not necessarily White to win the game. This is an important
point because people must remember that ‘winning’ is not the same as ‘won’ and
the game might well go on into an endgame. However, the author cannot and should
not give the theme/game away so it is fair just to say ‘to win’ etc. He does
mention this at the beginning of the book.
Part
way through the book we have this example: It is White to play and the theme is
discovered check.
The
beginner will see that the bishop on e4 must move in order to check the king
from the rook on e1, but where should the bishop go. Some may take the knight,
others may take the pawn on b7 but how quickly would they find 1.Bc6++ leading
to checkmate next move? It’s very nice and shows that mate is more important
than material.
Then
I will show you the very last puzzle in the book to see how far the student
will have travelled on their chess learning journey. It
is White to play and checkmate Black in one move.
This is a composition from
the famed chess composer Leonid. Kubbel and even strong players struggle to
find the answer. This in part is why I might take issue with the statement on the back cover that
there are ‘hundreds of easy puzzles.’ Okay there are many easy ones but also
some challenging ones for beginners, but actually that is precisely how it
should be.
So
to the above position. Did you find the answer? It is 1.Qa3 checkmate.
There
is another aspect that I like. The author quite rightly states that nobody is going
to tell you what the motif (tactics) is in your actual games so you need to
learn to recognize them without any hints. Therefore in some positions Bennedik
asks multiple choice questions:
A) White is winning
B) The position is equal
C) Black can win
Very
good. You can do these puzzles without a chess set in front of you, on the bus,
train or in your own home in bed or an armchair – it’s great fun actually.
There
are checkmate patterns throughout such as ‘The kiss of death’ and ‘Swine mate.’
These are the stepping-stones to self-improvement. We all know that pattern
recognition is key and learning them saves much time over the board, as well as
collecting wins.
Does the book achieve its aim?
It
does, and in a very instructive manner. I can easily imagine having this book
as a beginner and I would absolutely devour its contents. I like it because it
isn’t ‘just’ puzzles but positions with many themes such as checkmating patterns,
Black/White to win or Black/White to defend or Black/White to checkmate. It is
put together with though and care – with a nice easy running order. I can tell
that this is about more than just puzzles and answers, there’s love in there
also.
I
could imagine every school chess club in the UK having this book and every
student using it to improve quickly. I wish I had it when I was a kid, that’s
for sure. I want to recommend the book therefore and shout out for both Martin
Bennedik and the publishers Simon & Schuster. I do believe that the author
has another book aimed at intermediate level, and I should like to see that
one. I simply had fun going through the book. I enjoyed reading new and
interesting ways of projecting the necessary information to teach chess to
beginners. It isn’t always easy so well done.
Is
there anything missing, I ask myself? Possibly the only point I would make is
there might have been an index of players, but this is nit-picking and not key
to the quality of the book.
Oh
go on then – I will make an exception. I enjoyed this tome so much that I am
going to treat you to one more delightful puzzle. It is White to play and draw.
You
want the answer? Well, you could buy the book and support this excellent author.
Who is the author?
Martin Bennedik is an international correspondence
chess master and the founder of ChessPuzzle.net. Since launching in 2016,
ChessPuzzle.net has become one of the most popular sites for online chess. In
addition to housing hundreds of thousands of chess puzzles with annotated
solutions, the site offers a premium membership including Puzzle Academy
wherein users receive customized training programs based on their tactical
strengths and weaknesses. A chess club player and freelance .NET developer,
Bennedik has also collaborated with chess grandmaster and world champion Magnus
Carlsen on the popular puzzles and training app, Play Magnus. He lives in Frankfurt am Main, Germany.
