Glenn Snow wrote on 04/07/19 at 04:17:47:
Quote:Reading through the Index on Variations in the sample, I'm wondering where 1.c4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.e3 e5 or 1.c4 c4 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nc3 Nc6 4.e3 e5 are covered. I'd thought this was causing problems for white, but either they are dismissed with a short note or they have just been missed.
I looked through the index of the first book in the series and I don't see it there either.
It's covered in the annotated games (2 and 3).
Ah, but a bit superficially
I ordered both volume 1 & 2 together and received them earlier this week. My expectations: good coverage of interesting/unexplored ideas, multiple options against mainlines, convincing improvements over existing theory/books, clear direction and good explanation of plans - and to be clear, this is what seems to be there and the books are well worth having. Initial impression would be to give these books both 4/5.
However it seems that there are a few lines missing (that are not explicitly said to be missing - e.g. it is recommended to transpose to QGD but it is out of scope) that surprise me. It's of course possible that I haven't seen where they are as coverage is split across chapters.
From what I've noticed from browsing so far:
In the line I queried above, which I found when opening the book for the first time:
1.c4 c5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nc3 Nc6 4.e3 e5 5.d4 cxd4 6.exd4 e4 7.Ne5 Bd6!? which I thought was the current problem here is not mentioned. Neither is 5...exd4 6.exd4 d5 which I'd like to know what to do against, but I give a pass here as no other book I know mentions it! But 5...cxd4 is covered in a small note to their mainline 5...e4 where coverage looks good enough at first glance.
Panjwani's Maroczy coverage has been checked carefully here, but after
1.c4 c5 2.Nf3 g6 3.e4 Bg7 4.d4 cxd4 5.Nxd4 Nc6 6.Be3 Nf6 7.Nc3 Ng4 8.Qxg4 Nxd4 9.Qd1 only 9...e5 is covered, 9...Ne6 seems to be missing.
1.c4 e5 2.Nc3 Bb4 3.Nd5 and it's mentioned black has tried 12 moves but only 3 are covered - 3...Bc5, 3...a5 and 3...Ba5 (briefly). I would have expected 3...Be7 (second most popular) to have some coverage.
1.c4 b6 is totally missing.
Experienced players should hopefully be able to plug these holes themselves, but at least for people starting 1.c4 they should know some things aren't in here. But then there is the nagging worry that in the lines I don't know anything about, what is missing there?
To reiterate: first impression is that these are excellent books with a few holes in coverage. The 7.Ne5 Bd6!? line above is the biggest bugbear for me personally as last time I looked at it I didn't find anything for white, the others I have something in my files already.