Exigentsky:

Secret of Pawn Endings is probably the best single work on pawn endings, but its 280 pages probably make it more useful as a reference work than anything else.  I think the treatment of pawn endgames in more general endgame manuals (e.g., Dvortesky's Endgame Manual, 53 pages; Makarov's The Endgame, 36 pages; de la Villa's 100 Endgames You Must Know, 45 pages) is probably sufficient for most players.

As to the other four books you mention, I have some comments:

Sherevksy's Endgame Strategy covers some of the main principles of endgame strategy (e.g., "do not hurry," schematic thinking, the principle of two weaknesses, etc.), with separate chapters on each principle that analyze a number of practical examples.  The examples are well-chosen for their pedagogical value, the annotations are chatty and instructive, and this book is justifiably considered a classic.  Originally designed as training material for aspiring Russian players, it requires some effort and is probably chiefly intended for players with a certain level of basic knowledge of theoretical endings.

Secrets of Chess Endgame Strategy by Lars Bo Hansen has three parts.  Part I is on general principles of endgame strategy and covers many of the same concepts as Sherevsky, albeit in somewhat less detail.  Part II organizes different types of endgames by material balance (e.g., pawns, minor pieces, major pieces, complex endings, etc.), and contains analysis of positions with an emphasis on strategy and guiding principles.  Part III is mainly a discussion of Hansen's theory of 4 types of chess players, and although it contains some nice endgames Hansen's theory of types is, IMO, chiefly of novelty value.  Overall, a decent book, with many useful comments hidden in the text, but a bit disorganized (at points, the presentation is basically a fairly random collection of strategical comments) and this detracts somewhat from its pedagogical value.  There is a lot more material here than in Sherevsky, but I don't think the material is presented as well.

How to Play Chess Endgames by Muller and Pajeken is organized much like Sherevsky's work, with a separate chapter on each concept, and covers virtually all of the same concepts covered in Sherevsky, plus a number of additional concepts.  It is, in fact, a somewhat more comprehensive and complete version of Sherevsky's book.  It's well-organized, it has numerous examples on each them, and it has around 250 exercies scattered throughout with comprehensive solutions at the end. 

I actually agree, to some extent, with both Paddy's and Dink's comments about How to Play Chess Endgames.  Like Paddy, I think that this book is, in terms of completeness, organization, and didactive value, easily the best book ever written on endgame strategy.  It is simply chock full of useful stuff, and anyone who manages to work through this entire book and seriously attempt the exercises could not help but raise their level of endgame understanding substantially.

However, I agree with Dink that this book is less consciously thematic, less digestible, even somewhat drier than Sherevsky.  To a certain extent, I think that this difference in presentation results from the nature of the beast; Muller and Pajeken are exploring the same concepts as Sherevsky, but often in more complex and less straightforward contexts, and their annotations often reflect that fact.  However, Muller definitely has a somewhat dry style of writing that will not appeal to everyone, and his books tend to be rather dense and without much filler.  Ultimately, I don't think that the criticisms made by Dink, although not without validity, detract signficantly from the value of the book.  I for one rather like Mueller and Pajeken's rather dry didactic style, in which they are frequently telling you: "Please always keep clear in your mind that...," "it is absolutely essential to know that...," and so on.  This kind of emphasis can be useful if appropriately employed (and it is) and if you pay attention to it.  Anyone who has watched Muller's endgame DVDs probably knows what I mean. ("You must practice this position with friends at your club until you can play it PERFECTLY without any mistakes." [Serious, somewhat owlish look from Muller.])  Overall, I have to agree with Paddy that this is a modern classic that will probably eventually become standard training material for the chess champions of the future.

Flear's Practical Endgame Play - Beyond the Basics is essentially a collection of annotated endgames all involving non-theoretical positions with either two pieces v. one piece or two pieces v. two pieces (plus Kings and Pawns).  Its a large book (534 pages, double columns) and contains a large number of positions satisfying Flear's criteria.  This book is slightly different from the other three you mentioned in that it's not primarily a endgame strategy manual (it was not intended to be); instead, its a loosely organized annotated collection of complex endings with instructive comments.  That having been said, Flear annotates a huge number of endings of a level of complexity that is not well-covered in the literature.  The endings are often from games between world class players, Flear writes well and often entertainingly, and his annotations are full of interesting observations and instructive points.  

I don't think Flear's book would be the most appropriate book for learning general principles of endgame strategy.  It would be more useful as a reference work, or for someone who has studied the general principles of endgame strategy already and wants to see how those principles play out in a large number of well-annotated examples.  Personally, so far I've tended to dabble in this book, going through a few positions from time to time when I'm in the mood, and then putting the book aside for a while until the urge returns.  Still, a very impressive piece of work and clearly a labor of love from Flear.

All of the above books are quite decent (three of them I would say are very good), and a close study of any of them probably would pay substantial dividends.  If I had to make a recommendation, I would recommend either (a) Sherevsky, for a player of around 1900 - 2100 ELO who has quite a bit of basic endgame knowledge but has never studied endgame strategy in an organized form, and wants the best and most digestible introduction to the subject; or (b) Muller and Pajeken, for a stronger or more ambitious player who is interested in a more comprehensive approach to endgame strategy and exercises to test his/her comprehension, and is willing to put in a serous effort for serious results.  Hansen's book is a decent effort but I probably wouldn't recommend it for most people because I believe both Sherevsky and Muller/Pajeken are superior alternatives.  Flear's book is mostly useful as a reference or for someone who wants access to a large number of well-annotated complex endings.

The Final Countdown is supposed to be an interesting book on pawn endings.

We'll definitely have to agree to disagree, both on these examples, and in general. I don't need to be told that fundamental transformations are critical; that's true almost by definition. 
That kind of advice puts me in mind of the lazy tennis coach's mantra: "Watch the ball, bend your knees, that will be 50 dollars please". 

Ironically, I was just flipping through my recently acquired copy of Secrets of Pawn Endings this weekend, and I spot a familiar position; it's the pawn ending from Gurevich - Krasenkov. Nicely annotated it is too.

Now this book is absolutely superb, with well-chosen examples, nice analysis, and skirting a couple of pitfalls (dry as dust presentation, overdoing the corresponding squares stuff) which other authors fall into.

Paddy, it's true that I've only given the book a superficial look so far.
But I'll give you a couple of examples of the types of thing that put me off.



p.93 Gurevich - Krasenkov, White to play.

M+P write: "White has the difficult choice between continuing his attack with 1 Qb8+ and liquidating into an endgame with 1 Nxf6. What would you have done?" They go on to show that 1 Nxf6 was a mistake, as White has a winning 14 move sequence beginning 1 Qb8+. 

The game continued:
1 Nf6 Rxf4; 2 Nxh7+ Rxh7; 3 Rxf4+ Ke7; 4 Rf7+ ("!?") Rxf7;5 exf7 Kxf7, and they write:
"Probably Gurevich assessed this endgame as easily won for White in view of his outside passed pawn. As complicated analysis later showed, however, Black can defend, since there is so little winning potential left on the board."
Said complicated analysis remains entirely in the shadows, since the rest of the game is given without any further annotation!

So they analyse out the middlegame attack, but have zero to say about the ending, reducing the value of the example to a humdrum tactical exercise. I fail to see the value of this.

Next diagram but one is even stranger:



p.95 Gashimov - Dautov, Black to play.

"Liquidation into an endgame with an unequal material distribution is an especially difficult decision. Dautov has the choice between carrying out the standard plan of ...c5 or liquidation into such an endgame. He made the correct decision:

1...Nxe5! (After 1...c5?!; 2 Nxd7 Rxd7; 3 dxc5 White has counterplay)
2 dxe5 Bxe5; 3 Qxe5 Qxe5; 4 Rxe5 Nc3+; 5bxc3 Rxd1 =+
Black is better; furthermore the position is a lot easier for him to play. However the game was later drawn."

I find this trite, superficial and not focussed on the relevant issue, which should be the accurate evaluation of the resultant position.

Also, somewhat annoyingly, a lot of the exercises are framed by very leading questions, eg p.97 E4.29 "How does White draw easily?"

Of course, there are numerous interesting examples, but this should give some indication of why I find the work rather superficial and unfocused

Just got the book. A bit underwhelmed.

On the positive side, most of the examples are quite modern, so not rehashing the same old, same old. The corollary to this is that in many cases, play is a bit murky, which makes for interesting play but dilutes the didactic impact IMO. 

Overall, the book can't be compared to Shereshevsky. Shereshevsky is more discursive and thematic, while this reads more like a collection of nice endings with no meaningful attempts to draw any general conclusions.

This is chess in the computer age;  concrete is in, general is out. Fair enough, but IMO, Shereshevsky has far more didactic value, as he is teaching you how to fish rather than presenting you with a menu of tasty fishes.

Paddy wrote on 03/19/08 at 13:01:08:


Wow, yes, my first ever end games book. I've still got the 1977 English Translation. Now that takes me back...

Gerry1970 wrote on 03/18/08 at 01:38:58:


Most of it is Shereshevsky-type stuff, but IMHO better presented and more readable and dealing with more topics, with more modern examples and exercises. 

For more info and reviews, see

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

But I think some prior knowledge of basic endings is definitely required to get the best out of HPCE.

For this I usually recommend James Howell's book, or the endgame section in John Littlewood' book Chess Coaching, but recently I came across a little book (64 pages) translated from German, End Games in Chess, by Theo Schuster, which at first glance seems to be a very readable endgame primer (or refresher). Anybody else used this?