katar wrote on 11/04/15 at 21:33:52:

The Advance Caro is the main reason I'm about to abandon it.

GM Kasparov writes a book about the Qd6 Scandinavian and inserts chapters on the Qa5 and Qd8 variations. Without even looking closer you have to be a little suspicious about the organization or choice of the same. I'm these other variations have no legitimate place in the book. I'm guessing these other chapters were fillers to meet a deadline.

Stigma wrote on 11/06/15 at 03:18:45:

I agree with you on both counts.

katar wrote on 11/06/15 at 01:54:53:

That's all true. It might be a very good book covering everything you need to play it; we'll have to see. I may pick it up myself at some point.

The mere 27 pages for 3...Qa5 (not to mention 11 pages for 2...Nf6) looked particularly strange, since that older move still has a lot more theory than 3...Qd6. But maybe what's happening here is Kasparov is providing both a repertoire for White with 3.Nc3 and one for Black with 2...Qxd5 intending 3.Nc3 Qd6 in one book. That would make some sense of the page distribution. Let's hope it's not just "I had some random material on 3...Qa5 and 2...Nf6, and decided to throw it in".

Stigma wrote on 11/05/15 at 03:28:16:

About 115 pages relate to 1.e4 d5 2.ed Qd 3.Nc3 Qd6 and White's deviations. 
Particularly for an opening whose supposed virtues are simplicity and lack of theory, that should be sufficient...  S.Kasparov covers Qa5 in 27 pages (plus 29 for White's earlier deviations) and Qd8 in 4 (plus the same 29 for White's earlier deviations).
Anyone can access Stockfish and a 5 million game database in a matter of minutes.  Where a grandmaster author can truly add value is in organization and priority.  In my opinion, a short chess opening book is more useful than a long one -- and i expect harder to write as well.  Diminishing returns and pareto principle mean the shorter book always gives more bang per buck (or per hour of study time).  But it is a matter of taste and of course there is market for "telephone book" chess opening books.  (A chess openings forum is naturally skewed to that market.)

I haven't seen the book, but one thing in S. Kasparov's (and the book's) favor is that it's produced by Gambit. Their opening, and other, books are always well-edited and usually very well-written.

Bibs wrote on 11/05/15 at 11:49:02:

I really liked his Benko book.

Incidentally, Understanding the Scandinavian by Sergey Kasparov is just out (at least as an e-book and app book) and must be very relevant for Caro folks considering the Scandinavian:

http://www.gambitbooks.com/books/Understanding_the_Scandinavian.html

From the excerpt it looks like the coverage is spread over lots of lines, sort of a "complete" book rather than just a repertoire for Black. I wonder how he pulls that off in just 176 pages, while even providing "understanding", presumably with lots of explanatory text.

Anyway, 3.Nc3 Qd6 4.d4 Nf6 5.Nf3 c6 seems to get the most coverage, and that very solid main line is clearly similar to the Caro-Kann.

There has also been quite a bit of coverage of 3.Nc3 Qd6 here on ChessPublishing, and it was also the focus of Lakdawala's Move by Move book on the Scandinavian, which may have been one of his better ones.