Chess Beneath the Surface

Description

Seeing chess the way a grandmaster sees it

The most important difference between a club player and a grandmaster is not simply that the latter calculates better, it is that they see more deeply. That is the premise of this extraordinary book, recognised as the best chess book published in 2018 by the English Chess Federation. Jan Markos does not teach variations or openings: he teaches a different way of perceiving the board, of seeing what lies beneath the surface of the game.

The book shows how a strong player perceives the game: which characteristics of the position they focus on, how they make decisions at the board, how they manage aspects like time, openings and the relationship with analysis engines. It is an immersion in the psychology and phenomenology of high-level play that illuminates both the player who wants to improve and the enthusiast who simply wants to understand what makes the best players different.

Who is this book for?

• Club players who want to make the qualitative leap in their understanding of the game
• Intellectually curious enthusiasts about how a grandmaster’s mind works
• Coaches looking for material to work on perception and decision-making with students

Technical details

• Author: Jan Markos
• Publisher: La Casa del Ajedrez
• ISBN: 9788412112924
• Pages: 252
• Year: 2019
• Language: Spanish
• Award: ECF Book of the Year 2018

You might also like

• The Secret Ingredient: Markos’s next work with Navara on competitive performance
• The Invisible Moves in Chess: another book on tactical perception from a complementary angle
• Foundations of Chess Strategy: the systemic strategic framework that complements this cognitive perspective