Forcing Chess Moves: The Key to Better Calculation - Charles Hertan

Instantly Improved My Game

Let's face it, computers are outpacing humans on the chess board and have been for about 10 years now. For this reason, "Forcing Chess Moves" doesn't take a human approach to teaching calculation. Instead the author encourages the reader to adopt "Computer Eyes" while learning to calculate. The first two chapters are devoted completely to developing perfect two-move calculation, which Hertan believes is the key to mastery. I wouldn't know since I'm not a master, but I do know that through studying the two and three move mating puzzles he presented I've seen instant improvement in my game and calculation.

Another area that this masterful piece of work helped me improve is in understanding the tactics of sacrificing a piece. I tend to play for material advantage, so understanding the art of piece sacrifice has never really been my strong suit. By presenting a series of clear and fascinating sacrifice puzzles, Mr. Hertan furthered my knowledge of this technique. I still don't use them that often, but I now can recognize a sacrifice gambit when I see one.

What really impressed me, though, is Hertan's tone. His writing style is very direct, at times ascerbic, at times witty but always scholarly and excited. It is clear that Hertan really loves chess and the art of calculation. Be warned, though: The book can be grueling. It jumps right into calculation puzzles and positions and never lets up. There's very little theory or flowery text like in the works of Seirawan or Waitzkin. It is puzzle after puzzle after puzzle of interesting and formidable positions.

Best tactics book on the market

I currently own three chess books published by New in Chess, this publisher is the best of the bunch, high quality productions that exceed Gambit Books efforts. The 650 puzzles in Forcing Chess Moves are arranged in a logical sequence and have clear explanations. If you are rated under 1800 then The Complete Chess Workout is a better choice. I enjoy reading chess books and would rather lay on my back in bed and read a chess book than start a family and pop out three kids and send them to college and go into debt and pay off a mortgage and a car loan and credit cards and work like a slave or indentured servant in order to fulfill someone else's idea of the American dream, the American dream being to become enslaved to debt and work all your life and die a pauper with no savings. Yes, chess has saved my life!

Should Be Converted to Software

Charles Hertan and New In Chess publishers are missing a great opportunity to convert this book to training software. A case can be made that Hertan's book is more pedagogically focussed than CT - Art 3.0, which dominates that field.

Relative to most other tactics books, this one actually advocates a straightforward thinking method involving forcing moves and, to a better degree than many similar efforts, does not focus on mating combinations almost to the complete exclusion of tactical opportunities for material gain, which are likely more commonplace in practice. "Stock" tactical motifs are covered in the first two chapters. I dare say that 98% of chess tactic books merely provide the information in those two chapters with varying degrees of examples. In this 400-page effort, Hertan moves well beyond that to more broadly consider and categorize forcing moves generally, many of which do not easily fit into traditional typologies.

I'm not necessarily convinced that Hertan's advocated postition of always addressing oneself first to hard calculation of forcing lines, rather than relying initially on more judgmental assessments to identify candidate moves, would survive a cost (in time) benefit analysis in many situations. Accordingly, I am in turn not necessarily convinced of his assertion that "A deep study of forcing moves is probably the single most important task toward achieving chess mastery." Some positions present a bewildering array of forcing moves and, in Hertan's explanations, this fact can sometimes be conveniently ignored, with solutions presented as if the winning move was necessarily the most forcing, which is not really the case. In these cases finding the winning move likley is the product of some process other than raw calculation of a large number of equally forcing moves. Likewise, the separate concept of "computer eyes" is gimmicky and unnecessary to his thesis -- the term is used in connection with the unremarkable concept that identifying the most forcing moves may include moves that are counterintuitive to humans, and that the human bias against considering such moves is not a tendency shared by chess engines. (While I really have no clue, I gather that chess computers in fact do not consider forcing moves first, and thus the computer allusion has no particular relevance to Hertan's thesis.)

This is not to say that Hertan's unique perspective, argument regarding thinking methods, and wealth of fresh examples from practical play, is not appreciated, or that adding increased consideration to forcing sequences will not contribute something of real practical value to those who need to sharpen their alertness to tactics. Hertan suggests at the end of the book that he wished it could be one's first book on tactics. Very few of Hertan's readers are likely to be blank slates, but I suspect that the greater value of his book will be to add new and useful dimensions to the play of those of us whose tactical approach runs somewhat in a rut.

Not insignificantly, the layout and production values of this book are above average. Returning to my initial point, the only way to materially improve the presentation would be to convert the book to training software.

Deserted Island; must have.

I'm a big fan of studying tactics to improve at chess, and I have a large collection of books on the subject. This is a very well written book on tactics, and is quickly becoming one of my favorites. Good layout, large diagrams, and the fonts and printing are excellant. This challenging book contains 650 fresh and very exciting tactical positions divided into examples and exercises. My only possible critism is that it could use even more exercises, but I keep a note card in the book to cover the answers to the examples and I use them as exercises also. This may not be the best for a beginners first book on tactics, but it is outstanding for intermediate players looking to improve. It is defintely on my deserted island must have list.

Not just another Tactics book

I've got plenty of tactics books, even tactical programs like ct-art (which is awesome btw). But there is something magical about this book! The tactics are so rich and vibrant and truely do change the way you look at positions. You'll find after going through about 50 of these puzzles (out of 650 I think) that you are yourself looking at the board differently. Also this book is thick for a modern day chess book less than 20 bucks, I was shocked to get this book in my hands and discover how the publishing company didnt "cheap out" on the size or text like they were going out of business... Buy this book, you wont regret it...