Silmans Complete Endgame Course by Jeremy Silman (Jan 31 2007)

“Silman’s Complete Endgame Course” is easily the best, most pedagogically sound, and systematic approach to endgame study. What’s more, it is effective for any player at any level, save GM. My first introduction to endgames were Reuben Fine (a good book, but not a good first book) and Pandolfini’s book on edings (a good book, but not a great first book). Silman very mindfully made the necessary adjustment to the arrangement of content, which is the primary failing of these other books I’ve mentioned, namely, that most books are just compilations based on type of endings (e.g., pawn endings, minor piece endings, etc.), not differentiated on the basis of difficulty and relevance. I can’t tell you how many endings in Pandolfini’s endgame book I’ve never seen, or Fine’s, for that matter. I went through Silman’s manual, first as a 1400, and I was seeing endings I had actually lost in USCF tournament games! This is because he’s broken the chapters down into classes (Master [2200-2399], Expert [2000-2199], A-Class [1800-1999], B-Class [1600-1799], C-Class [1400-1599], D-Class [1200-1399], and so on). In addition to that, not only does he give the most commonly seen and necessary(!) for a given strength, but he also has a pedagogical mind towards building knowledge systematically. He first teaches the Philidor position in one section, then in a much later section (Expert, I think), he explains how to still achieve a draw when the Philidor position wasn’t quite possible to set up. He also has this brilliant idea of “flow chart” thinking –and I mean this is just BRILLIANT! In this kind of thinking, he takes a super complex position, even one that is still in the middle game, and asks you to imagine types of endings that might arise out of it, what forcing exchanges might move into that ending, and then explains how to put all the basic known endings into perspective with respect to the complex position. I gained so much out of this that it is unreal!Another item I must comment upon is the tidbits of advice that Silman gives, which might cost someone hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars in one-on-one coaching time. For instance, Silman says that, in his experience, he’s only had one time in which a game has resulted in a K, N, & B vs. a K, and most players never learn how to mate with just a N and B; so, if in dire straits, it could be a strategy to force a much stronger opponent into an ending of that kind. I used this strategy, and it’s worked out twice!! If you look at my USCF statistics, I drew a 1914-rated player as a 1445 player, and I drew a 1983-rated player (almost Expert!) as a 1526 player. Both told me something like, “eh, I sort of know how to do it, and I thought I could do it if I needed, but obviously I couldn’t get the mate.” These nuggets are strewn throughout the book.I should say something about the limitations of the book. If you had to get one endgame book only, this is it. However, I highly recommend supplementing it with “Practical Chess Endings” by Keres and “100 Endgames You Must Know” by de la Villa. The reason is that there are important endings that are not covered by Silman, and he gives you some advice as to what you want to look for –he’s very, very aware of what he’s doing as a teacher, and the holes in his text are noted, as well as the reasoning for the existence of those holes. For instance, he thinks the payoff for learning certain rook-and-pawn endings is too little for the amount of effort that would go into learning them; but he tells you what they are, which is of immense value. He says the same of mating with a B & N. In my experience, which is somewhat extensive in endings, the two books I mentioned are the best supplements to this text.In short, if there are only 10 books a Class player (1999 and lower USCF rating) could ever afford or own, Silman’s manual would be on my list of must-haves.