Beginner Chess Puzzles by Martin Bennedik

subtitled 500 Practice Exercises to Take Your Game to the Next Level.

Despite being a huge fan of games and puzzles of all kinds, chess has never been my thing. I have tried since I was a kid to learn and enjoy it but I get super bored and, frankly, can’t see all the options on the board and usually lose. Some people might believe that this says something about my psychological makeup, tho I suspect it only means that I don’t care for chess. I’m a monster at checkers tho, lol.

So when Beginner Chess Puzzles landed on my desk, I figured this would be a good time to learn some tricks and tips, especially since my eldest has recently learned how and likes to play, usually against his dad. Eldest has also taken to making me play a game of chess for every game of Magic The Gathering: Bloomburrow that I can successfully pester him into. And while I am a good loser, I do get tired of losing at chess all the time, so I figured that reading this book certainly couldn’t hurt my chances. Worst case scenario if my lack of competence at the game of kings proves irremediable: I could give my eldest this book to help him improve his own game going forward.

Having finally finished reading and working my way through this volume, I can confidently say that this is an excellent resource for the novice! It has taken me over a month to finish it, mostly because it’s so much information that I can only digest it in small chunks, but I definitely feel smarter for having read it. Bonus: eldest and I would work on some of the puzzles together, which was a great way of bonding over a game I’m otherwise (still) entirely lukewarm over.

The main thing I appreciated about BCP is that it’s really well divided into the many basic chess strategies. It does assume that you already know the basics of the game, however, so this is not a book for learning how to play. This is, instead, a book of strategy and practice. In its 200+ pages, you learn about captures, forks, pins, defense, attack, and a ton of other subjects I’ve likely already forgotten. If you don’t already know how the pieces move, you definitely don’t want to start here. But if you know enough to muddle your way across a board — and, crucially, if you want to get better at it — then this absolutely the book for you.

In addition to strategies, this book also teaches notations and history, which I felt really bring the culture of chess to life. Best of all, each chapter comes with tons of exercises that perfectly illustrate each lesson. There are 500 exercises here total and after several chapters, I stopped trying to do them all, lest it take me multiple months to go through the entire book. Instead I did the first and last of each practice set, including the Workout sections that cover everything you’ve learned so far. I did admit to being thrown by the second Workout section, as it’s only announced with a tab at the side and I thought we were still working on the lesson, but that’s pretty much the only flaw in this entertaining and otherwise very thoughtfully designed volume.

I also received the Intermediate Chess Puzzles by the same author, but reader, I simply cannot. I am sure that someone with a greater enthusiasm for chess will love it. As a beginner, I thoroughly appreciated what I learned from BCP. Perhaps one day I’ll be able to move on to its sequel — it certainly looks just as accessible as BCP! — but I am simply not yet capable of appreciating tougher chess puzzles. Let me know if you give it a whirl tho!

Beginner Chess Puzzles by Martin Bennedik was published November 12 2024 by Adams Media and is available from all good booksellers, including