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Pawn Structure Chess |
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Reviews |
| | Pawn structure  |
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This is an advanced book. It requires some studying to understand the concepts. This is the kind of information you need to move up to the next level of thinking. It is well laid out with good examples and explanations. I was already noticing new ideas in my play after the first chapter. |
| | Not enlightening at all. Way overrated.  |
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I can't understand why so many people praise this book. Sure, Soltis devotes chapters to many different structures, but he doesn't teach us anything in those chapters that a good specialized opening book wouldn't cover. The advice is very basic and the prose he gives is, to me, insufficient.
He provides supplemental games that don't always fit well with the content of the chapter, and even if they do the notes to these games are very scant.
This same author's Opening Analysis for Advanced Players (I have the 2nd part but have never seen the first part) is EXCELLENT. This one is not.
There are a handful of chess authors (chess fans who have been around the game know who I'm referring to) who pump out tons of chess books. 1/3 to 1/2 of them are decent-to-well-done, and the remainder are trash. I wouldn't place this book in the "trash" category, but it leaves a lot to be desired. |
| | What this book is about, and what it is not about  |
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This book is not about openings! Although some discussion about openings and their relationship to "pawn structure" is necessary, the pawn structure is the subject. The moves Nf3, d4, c4, and many others can lead to the same structure. You can buy hundreds of books about openings. This book is different. In my opinion, studying opinings without understanding the concepts in this book is a waste of time.
One think I like is that Soltis does not claim that either black or white has a win from any basic structure. For each structure, he shows tactics/maneuvers for both sides. If you want to buy a book that shows that you always win if you play a certain opening, this book is not for you.
The blurb on the cover, "How to handle all characteristic pawn structures," is false. I don't think there is more than one example of Benoni formations in the book. However, the author did not write the blurb. What Soltis said was, "This book explores several of the more important pawn structures." Not all possible pawn structures. I do not think a book truly covering "all possible pawn structures" will ever exist. Soltis could have written a book four times longer, but it would cost 4 times as much, and few would buy it. I wish Soltis would write a second volume for "Pawn Structure Chess."
However, I think most chess players could study this book for years and gain very useful knowledge.
Let's go back to the coverage of Benoni formations. Suppose you like to play the Benoni, but your opponent plays Nf3 before d4. Instead of pushing his d-pawn to d5, he allows you to capture c5xd4. You are now playing the black side of the Maroczy Bind (see the sub-chapter "Maroczy Unbound" in "The open Sicilian-English" in this book). A player who understands structure, rather than one who only memorizes opening moves, has an advantage, although even an excellent positional player can fall into a tactical trap occasionallly.
This book is not specifically about isolated pawns, doubled pawns, etc., although sometimes those are covered in the context of pawn structures. You can get many books on those subjects.
If you read this book, you will inevitably find some positions that you find unclear. The first one I remember is p. 41-42, Maroczy-Chigorin 1899. The last paragraph says, "But now in the diagram White cannot play 15.nxe5 nxe5 16. without risking disaster after 16. Bb3 nf3! 17. Rad1 Bh3!
I still find this line unconvincing. I think 17 ...Bg4 is better.
Still, I wholeheartedly recommend this book. Also good are Marovic's "Understanding Pawn Play in Chess" and "Dynamic Pawn Play in Chess," which go beyond Soltis on certain subjects, but have less coverage than Soltis, for example, on the closed Sicilian. Marovic's organization is logical (open center, closed center, dynamic center) but I find Soltis's organization more useful (Caro, Slav, Open Sicilian-English, etc.) more useful, from my subjective point of view. Still, the Marovic books are wonderful too.
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| | Disappointing so far  |
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I have just started reading the book but I am getting to more and more be surprised by the overly positive reviews. Will the book improve in future chapters? I don't know. I hate too say that I don't like Soltis as an author yet I keep buying his books for the great promises in the title. I came to realize that his books are very short on instruction and in depth analysis but very rich on positions and games. The author speaks for two lines and then shows a complete game or a long battle no matter how ill connected to what he was saying before. This is what I have seen from this book as well. As other reviewes mentioned, the author doesn't help you to get the insight. He states something and then shows an example. I guess it's up to us to do the linking. That's why so far Soltis books have been the harder and longer for me to study. To begin with I ran one of the games through Fritz (Kasparov game in the introduction), and despite the number of sheer errors the author claims and how all these errors are linked to pawn structure, the only actual error was a straight blunder that led to losing a queen and all the way along White had the advantage and good chances for counter play. I think I'll leave the book until I can have more insight by myself without the help of the author. In such a case, a game book maybe as good as that book. Let's see. I am rated around 1500 USCF. |
| | The book is for advanced students |
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The book looks good but it is for advanced students
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