Don't bother with BCE.


Edit: Just realized you had two things called BCE in there, I mean Basic Chess Endings.

Happy New Year to all!

I was following this thread with a lot of interest and finally was convinced to buy Howell's Essential Chess Endings to read during the vacations.

I have read in the past Shereshevsky's Endgame Strategy and part of Keres' Practical Chess Endings, but needed sth like a quick-starter due to some tough team matches starting in February (unfortunately Keres' book needs a lot of energy and is a rather thick one).

Anyway, to sum this up, Howell's book is 100% designed for the average tournament player and ...is excellent!! So far I have read the chapters on pawn endings (which was traditionally my strong endgame point) and the Rook & pawns on the same side: Fun to read, easy to remember, packed with well thought advice. I enthusiastically recommned this to all.  

Ptero - no you're not; I've got it. And also indeed the old magazines (BCM, I think) in which a lot of the games were published. I agree with you; excellent stuff. I also agree with Micawber that the Belyavsky/Mikhalchishin series is surprisingly good, although terse and rather unattractively designed.

Lee Roth - lol about pawn-pushing and not hurrying! Glad to hear you've figured it out - I suppoe the idea is to push the pawns but in a considered and unhurried manner?

Another one I like is that collection of studies by Speelman and someone with a name a bit like Lipnitsky.

I saw quite an interesting endgame book the other day; a collection of puzzle positions by someone called John Hall, which I thought might be quite useful for young players in a cheap and cheerful  sort of way. Anyone know that?

Actually I think my comments probably aren't too useful on this thread, since the more I think about it the more I can't think of an endgame book I don't like. I suppose I wouldn't much fancy working through Nunn's encyclopedia of R and P -v- R, although it's hard to criticise such a work. Am I the only person who's never had a close R and P v R in all their career?

The best one volume book is I think Speelman Batchford Chess Endings
Despite the encyclopedic format it contains quite of usefull text.

Another book I can recommend is Beljavski: Winning endgame strategy.

I agree that Howell's and Shereshevsky's books are outstanding.  However, my favourite endgame book of all time is Rate Your Endgame by Edmar Mednis.  It's extremely light on theoretical positions, but I can't think of a better book to actually teach you how to play endgames--i.e., endgame technique.  I can't recommend this book enough.

Oh and someone ought to defend James H's honour, an English GM, if you don't mind, alumbrado!

Opps, didn't read carefully enough.  AmateurDragoneer had mentioned both Muller and Dvoretsky.  Sorry about that.

I have several endgame books, but the one I used most and always recommend is James Howell's Essential Chess Endings.