slates wrote on 04/17/08 at 23:57:13:
As I'm unable to purchase the ebook (still!) for reasons unknown, I'm now champing at the bit for the paperback release, and awaiting antillian's thoughts on his copy, should he care to post a mini-review based on his first viewing......
Well as someone who only plays non critical lines against the Slav as White, and very new to it as Black, I am hardly qualified to write any review, not even a mini-one. Nonetheless, here are a few random thoughts
Having looked through this ebook last night, it seems to me that Vigus is a lot more willing to break new ground in this book, than with his previous book.
For example, my initial attention was on the popular 6. Ne5 where Vigus recommends 6...Nbd7 7. Nxc4 Nb6. Vigus christens this previously obscure nameless line "The Sokolov Defence" and makes a strong argument for it. Having gone through some of the lines that he gives, I am surprised that this line has had so little attention before.
I checked some of my books to see what they say about this line. It is not mentioned at all in Sadler's "The Slav" or Flear's "Starting out the Slav/Semi-Slav". John Watson mentions it in passing only in "Mastering the Chess Openings Vol2" and Cox again only mentions it is a solid line, hard to crack in his "Starting out 1.d4".
White players who favour 6. Ne5 might feel obliged to get this book in order to deal with the expected surge in popularity of the "Sokolov Defence"
It will take me some time to be able to offer any more substantive thoughts.