It seems that the expectation from a repertoire book differs from my expectation. I would never expect to find all answer in it. What is needed is a brief tour through the opening with the thematic traps covered so I’m able to start playing it. Then when I analyse my games I will go into depth on the variation in the game and use whatever I have on this. ECO, database etc.
Many here seems to laugh of Chess Opening Explained … by Alburt etc. Well I find these books excellent and is exactly what you need to start playing those variants. Ex. In the Black repertoire book a big opening like Catalan are missing but I doubt anybody who have read the book would  feel uncomfortable when facing it eg. answering Bb4 and transpose into bogo-like positions.
As White I have used Khalifman’s according to Kramnik (5 volum), but you find yourself memorize variations instead of understanding the big picture of this repertoire, beside that this isn’t as fun it also have an expire date of the variation covered.
While I have bought both of Marin’s 1.e4 e5 books, I haven’t had the time to try out his repertoire yet but a brief look tell me that these books are in the road of what is needed from a repertoire book.
Nowadays with ICC and other Internet servers you can practice your opening as much as you want before taking it out to a serious game.
An extreme sample of use of repertoire book/video are here: Portuguese Gambit game
This I played (otb 30 min/g) after looking at Jesse Kraai’s 19 minutes ChessLecture-video on this opening.

Antillian wrote on 10/06/07 at 12:13:03:


Chess Stars have done it with their Sharpest Sicilian. And even more impressively and pro-actively, they did it without the prompting from disgruntled consumers.

Check out the thread The Sharpest Sicilian Updated in the Open Sicilian section.

Toppy  

rossia wrote on 10/05/07 at 14:36:21:


Sorry, copyright info!

GMTonyKosten wrote on 10/06/07 at 12:05:49:


Did Aagaard get all this info from the forum? If so he should acknowledge it.

Chess Stars already has a regular contributor here, perhaps Quality Chess could consider the same. It could result in even better products in future. As it is, it appears that the intended update maybe more valuable than the book.

Toppy    

Jacob Aagaard from Quality Chess emailed me to ask:
"You said there were some holes in the Marin book beyond what we already know about. It would be good if you could make a quick chessbase file with what you know. Mihail is preparing an Internet update soon for our site, so it would be good for him to know what he needs to look additionally at" and also "You said that there was a problem with the Ponziani line, also, I know that there was some questioning of the King's Gambit line. Futhermore, I know that 7.Qb3 is missing in the Evans Gambit, which is a real issue ."
Maybe we could try to make a complete list and send it to them? I can add 4 a3 in the Four Knights, as well, unless someone found this in the small print somewhere?

Markovich wrote on 10/05/07 at 13:17:25:


Can you please Mister post full Flear's review of Marin's books?

I'm looking forward!

Thanks in advance if possible 

Quote:


In fact Marin gives 4...Nf6 against the Scotch.