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Practical Chess Exercises: 600 Lessons from Tactics to Strategy

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Amazon's Best-Selling Chess Book!PLEASE The error that occurred with the Kindle update has been rectified. The Kindle version of this book is fully functional. If you are having problems viewing the images, please download it again.Raise your chess to the next level with this program of 600 instructive and challenging exercises covering all aspects of the game. This book will sharpen your tactical vision, deepen your positional understanding, and enrich your knowledge of theoretical positions. It will also strengthen your analytical skills, and instill a sound move selection process. Win more games and increase your enjoyment of chess!"This is the first book I've read that makes me feel like I'm in a real game, where I need to use my full thinking process to pick the best move."—Blue Devil Knight"If you study this book, you will acquire the most important chess skill of the ability to think for yourself."—John Watson, International Master, author of the award-winning Secrets of Modern Chess Strategy, Chess Strategy in Action, and Mastering the Chess Openings"In creating Practical Chess Exercises, Ray Cheng has turned a labor of love into a treasury of instructive problems to help non-beginners improve their chess. The problems are of all types—tactical and positional—and all levels. Best of all, they are not labeled in any way other than who is to move, so for each position you have to find the relevant concerns and properly address them. The answers are not just a list of moves, but they also include instructive prose. This book answers the prayers of chess enthusiasts looking for unmarked problems to test their skills."—Dan Heisman, U.S. National Master, author of the award-winning Novice Nook column at Chess Café and books such as A Parent's Guide to Chess, Looking for Trouble, and Everyone's 2nd Chess Book

1218 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 15, 2007

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Ray Cheng

3 books

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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
Profile Image for zed .
594 reviews154 followers
April 27, 2025
I am crap at chess. I spent a lot of money on books that I thought would at least make me competitive. Nothing worked. I think these chess books will all sit in a box gathering dust and one day I might get the urge to rejoin the local club and get butchered by 12 year olds so then may have a further look. (Generic review for all half finished chess books I will never finish)


IIRC this had some useful stuff for the idiot player such as myself.
Profile Image for Zardoz.
520 reviews9 followers
February 14, 2015
Interesting chess puzzles. The best part is you don't know what your looking for. Is it a mate in three or a tactical combination? Every piece has to be checked to see what the key to the problem is.
Profile Image for Ishamael Moridin.
8 reviews1 follower
October 14, 2021
For the sake of reference, I am an average B level, my tactics is not horrible by amateur standards.

I liked this book. On the one hand it was not as deep into tactics as my favorite, nor was it as deep into positional chess as some other books. But it was fun, and it was solvable. I found myself preferring it to Angus Dunnington's positional book and to many other tactical ones.

I am not sure how much I learned from this book. I don't remember any particular structures or patterns that I learned exclusively from this book. But then, it wasn't supposed to be a teaching guide. The emphasis was on practical exercises, so the book was exactly what it set out to do.

I feel, rightly or not, that starting from a solid D level, you could benefit from working with it. Sometimes even the effort of working it out for yourself creates unexpected progress in your chess.
Profile Image for Theodore Kinni.
Author 11 books39 followers
January 20, 2016
Once you've learned the basics, this collection of unmarked puzzles are a terrific way to improve your game - great book!!!
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews

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