Algebraic Alekhine!

Earlier this week Russell Enterprises put me on their list of official book reviewers.  For me this was wonderful news as I really was interested in their recently released algebraic version of My Best Games by Alekhine.

Yesterday it arrived in the mail, so I will be reviewing it for this blog and will have my review up in a couple of weeks if not sooner.

So far in playing through the games I am overjoyed.  I have a copy of the Dover version (and in fact recently gave away the two volume Tartan Press version) and while I don't mind descriptive notation, I strongly prefer algebraic.

The reason is that while in the opening it's not too difficult to play through descriptive in your head once you get to the middle game it becomes harder for me.  On the other hand, with algebraic I can easily play through variations in my head that are anywhere from three to five moves, on up to seven or so depending on the position.  This means that I don't have to play everything through on the board, which I personally believe helps with visualization.

Even better news...one of the other books that REI sent to me was Euwe's book on the World Championship tournament of 1948!!!  What a treasure trove!  I didn't even know that this book existed, but I have always enjoyed this tournament (although I've always felt bad for Euwe's miserable performance - he was one of my early heroes...)

Lastly I was sent a copy of My Chess by Hans Ree which is a collection of his stories.  I read the first 20 or so pages and was highly entertained!

So look for reviews of all three books coming soon!