The untested 1 e4 c6 2 d4 d5 3 e5 Bf5 4 h4 Qb6 5 h5 f6!? looks like an interesting idea. After a bit of clicking around I haven't found anything that seriously concerns me as Black. For example, 6 Bd3 Nh6! 7 Bxh6 Bxd3 looks like complications that are okay for Black, in part due to b2 being hanging, and 6 Nf3 fxe5 7 Nxe5 Nd7 8 f4 e6 9 c3 Ngf6 10 Nd2 Bd6 11 Be2 h6 12 g4 Bh7 looks dynamically balanced. Lots of uncharted territory to analyze here.

Laramonet wrote on 07/14/17 at 16:54:02:

If your opponent had read that section, he'd have seen that Shaw gives 6.b4 a questionmark 

fjd wrote on 07/13/17 at 17:05:32:

True, but look at the coverage of the less common 5.Nxc6 bxc6, and it's suddenly sharp and dangerous again (for both sides). 

I still feel the sharp dominates over the technical in the repertoire. Perhaps the ideal target audience is very strong calculators who put that skill to good use in both sharp middlegames and unbalanced endgames - i.e. someone like Alexei Shirov! 

I'm less sure if the average club and tournament player fits that description though, however much s/he would like to...

grandpatzer wrote on 07/13/17 at 14:01:49:

I also half-expected the Short system, but it has indeed seen a lot of coverage lately. Maybe he (or the team) didn't have enough new ideas to select it.

Actually, they way the first volume of "Playing 1.e4" turned out, I hardly recognize the solid, low-theory, endgame-oriented player John Shaw in the repertoire.

The Scotch is full of non-standard and sharp positions, including ones with White behind in development in the 4...Nf6 main lines, where missteps can be very costly and you really need to know what you're doing. And the lines against the Caro-Kann and the Pirc are among the very sharpest they could have gone for that are still topical tries for advantage today (though the Austrian Attack in the Pirc is arguably sharper still).

If the second volume comes out with lots of slow, positional squeeze or technical lines, that would be inconsistent stylewise!

4 dxc5, 5 a3

Shaw recommends 6.Nxc6 bxc6 7.Bd3. Now 7...Qh4 8.Qe2 Nf6 is only mentioned as a sideline in a note with no alternatives for Black on move 8. The main move is 7...Ne7.

Without the inclusion of 4...Bb4+ 5.c3 after 4...Bc5 5.Nxc6 bxc6 6.Bd3 now 6...Qh4 is the main move in the book.

I read in the book that Shaw was going to suggest the Short Variation of the Advance Caro-Kan as the line for White, rather than 4.h4, if it weren't for the fact that Dreev was going to write a book on that line! Although the 4.h4 line is very interesting and its coverage is excellent and was much needed, I would have loved to see Shaw on the "positional" Short Variation vs the Caro! And perhaps that was more in theme with the whole book, considering that the suggested lines are rather on the "positional" side than the "aggressive" one. (With all the limitations that these sort of classifications have, of course). Anyway, it's a great book, now let's see volume II !  And let's see how he is going to handle the Tarrasch! (I hope that it's not the Korchnoi Gambit vs. 3...Nf6, but the Ne2 line)