Have you ever wondered why it takes grandmasters just seconds to see what's happening in a chess position? It's all about pawn structures, as Ivan Sokolov explained in his groundbreaking book Winning Chess Middlegames.

In his 2010 bestseller, Grandmaster Sokolov focused on structures arising from 1.d4 openings; in this new companion guide, 1.e4 players get their turn. This new volume covers a dozen topical structures including various pawn formations in the flexible Ruy Lopez, Italian and Petroff openings. But also Black's doubled f-pawn in the Rauzer Sicilian, the notorious Maroczy Bind, the mysterious Hedgehog, the versatile Sveshnikov and the paradoxical French Winawer. Deeply analysed top-level games illustrate the motifs in all these structures.

Club players who study Winning Chess Middlegames 1.e4 or 1.d4 will:

• significantly improve their middlegame skills
• develop an accurate sense of which positions suit their style
• gain new strategic and practical knowledge of openings

Ivan Sokolov's analysis is profound but accessible, and he doesn't take anything for granted. As reviewer Sean Marsh wrote of the first volume: "The lucid and informative explanations convey a large amount of genuine Grandmasterly wisdom. This is easily one of the best middlegame books of recent times."

Ivan Sokolov is a top grandmaster who was born in Bosnia and lives in the Netherlands. He is a former Yugoslav and Dutch Champion and has beaten World Champions Garry Kasparov, Vladimir Kramnik and Viswanathan Anand. As a coach, he led Uzbekistan to victory at the 2022 Chennai Olympiad. Sokolov has written a dozen highly acclaimed books.

Andrew Burnett is a Scottish FM who has represented his country on several occasions. He is the author of cult classic Streetfighting Chess and his love of the Dragon opening stretches back to his teenage years when he was looking to escape from 1.e4 e5! He is currently working on the second volume of DragonMasters.
DragonMasters volume 1 charts the history of the most exciting and dangerous opening known to chess: the Dragon variation of the Sicilian Defence.
Unlike almost all other books on the Dragon, the focus is not purely on theoretical developments. Instead, the author has combined the most historically important games, the famous players who chose to fight either side (sometimes both sides!) of the opening, and the most unexpected and interesting stories featuring the Dragon. World champions, contenders for the crown, codebreakers, revolutionaries in every sense of the word, all feature in this remarkable and entirely unique look into the history of an opening variation. As the ancient maps say: Here be Dragons! 404 pages Hardcover

The English Opening is very popular nowadays, but 1.c4 e5! is a serious challenge and not to everyone's taste. Here comes 1.Nf3, with the idea to transfer the game into the English with c2-c4 to follow. The only hurdle on that path is 1...d5. Then White is at a crossroads. 2.c4 allows 2...d4 3.b4, while 2.e3 is an attempt to deny ...d4. Black can revive the threat with 2...c5, and again, White has a choice. 3.c4 d4 4.b4! leads to the Blumenfeld with reversed colours. Or he can continue to fight against ...d4 with 3.b3. White's decisions on the second and third move depends on the way he wants to meet the Queen's Gambit and the Slav/Meran/Chebanenko. Semkov covers in detail the different options, and also devotes several chapters on 1.Nf3 d5 2.e3 Nf6 3.c4 c6 and 3...e6 4.b3! (avoiding the innocuous version of the QGA after 4.Nc3 dxc4). There is another chapter on 1.Nf3 d5 2.e3 Nf6 3.c4 dxc4, where the absence of Nc3 allows White to get some pressure by refraining from d2-d4.   244 pages

Coach Christof has thoroughly revised and updated his 2018 best-selling chess opening manual. It covers everything you need to know when opening with 1.e4. You will get a complete White chess opening repertoire.

Why is this opening repertoire called simple? For the simple reason that the variations are easy to remember and require little or no maintenance.

International Master Christof Sielecki has created a hit series with his reliable opening lines for chess players of almost all levels. He developed this repertoire by working with students looking for something easy to understand and learn. Sielecki always clearly explains the plans and counter plans and keeps you focused on the position's requirements. Ambitious players rated 1500 or higher will benefit from studying this extremely accessible book.

Christof Sielecki is an International Master from Germany. He has taught and trained chess for many years and runs a popular YouTube channel called ChessExplained. He won numerous awards with his course on Chessable and has created three volumes of the Keep it Simple opening manuals.

Hardcover 630 pages

Improve Your Chess Now is a modern chess classic and one of the most inspiring chess improvement manuals. Adult improvers frequently name this book as one of their primary sources in the popular Perpetual Chess Podcast of Ben Johnson. The author is an American grandmaster now living in Norway. With infectious enthusiasm, Tisdall covers a wide range of topics, including visualization and calculation, pattern recognition, the psychological aspects of chess, the art of defence and the wisdom of blindfold chess - all still relevant more than 25 years later. The 1997 classic is reprinted with a modern design and a new foreword by the author. 238 pages

 In this book the highly experienced grandmaster Milos Pavlovic outlines a powerful repertoire for White based on 1 d4. The variations are very much based on strategic themes where an understanding of plans is far more important than memorisation of lines and move orders. The author focuses on important positional considerations such as:

•     Which pieces need to be traded off.
•     On which squares will pieces be most effective.
•     What is the best way to develop the initiative.

Nowadays many strong players try to beat opponents by learning sharp lines in the opening. However, it is also possible to do the same by obtaining positions where you have a great understanding of how to conduct the middlegame and thus can consistently outplay your opponent.

In Opening Repertoire: Strategic Play with 1 d4, Milos Pavlovic guides the reader through the chosen variations and carves out a complete repertoire for White. He examines all aspects of play and provides the reader with well-researched, fresh, and innovative analysis. Each annotated game has valuable lessons on the opening and contains instructive commentary on typical middlegame plans.

•     A complete repertoire for White with 1 d4.
•     A question and answer approach provides an excellent study method.
•     279 pages

The Sicilian Defence is the most attractive and most complicated opening in chess. If you don't play the Sicilian with White or Black, you miss much of the beauty and the challenges our royal game offers. For White 1.e4 players, building a repertoire against 1...c5 should be their priority.

Croatian top grandmaster Ivan Saric is one of today's greatest Sicilian experts. He plays 1.e4 with White and the Najdorf with Black! With The Open Sicilian, based on his highly acclaimed Chessable course, he has managed something impressive: a watertight repertoire against the Sicilian of just over 400 pages. But reading this one volume, your knowledge of this opening and chess, in general, will make a spectacular jump.

The Open Sicilian is not a phonebook crammed with computer lines but a textbook full of 21st-century chess wisdom. Saric covers the entire range of Sicilians, from obscure sidelines to the main lines: the Najdorf, the Taimanov, the Rauzer, the Kan, the Sveshnikov, and the various Dragons. His approach, firmly based on the ideas of the English Attack, is very ambitious, and he supports his claims with deep analysis and illuminating and elaborate verbal explanation.

Saric has written a book that will serve as a standard work for many years. He offers you the content to be fully armoured against all the intricacies of all the topical Sicilian lines.

Ivan Saric (1990) is a Croatian chess player who became an International Master at 17 and a Grandmaster at 18. He became U18 European Champion in 2007, U18 World Champion in 2008, and won the European Individual title in 2018. Saric beat Magnus Carlsen for his country at the 2014 Olympiad in Tromsø.

434 pages

The Four Knights Variation is a variation of the Sicilian Defense that most often occurs after 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 Nc6. It’s a good choice for all types of players – whether you’re an aggressive player who wants to attack your opponents or a more defensive player who prefers a slow and positional game, the Four Knights Variation is the right choice for you.

Learning to play the Four Knights Variation of the Sicilian Defense is not only beneficial for adding a powerful opening to your repertoire but can also improve your general chess understanding and knowledge. By studying this opening, players can learn about important concepts such as pawn structures, piece activity, and the importance of controling the center. Furthermore, the Four Knights Variation often leads to complex and tactical positions, which can help players improve their calculation skills and ability to recognize key tactical patterns on the board. All in all, mastering this opening can help players become more well-rounded chess players. 223 pages

Chess students love a Puzzle Rush. And solving tactics puzzles certainly helps you improve your pattern recognition and will help you find good moves in tournament games. But there is a downside to most tactics puzzles — we always know who is supposed to win!

Chess in real life is different, not just because no one taps us on the shoulder and tells us to look for a tactic. Sometimes tactics work, and sometimes they don't. Sometimes your opponent has a few tricks up their sleeve, too.

This book shows the reality of chess tactics. It explores a chess player's challenges over the board: attack, defense, and counterattack! It exposes the actual give-and-take nature of chess tactics. 224 pages