THE SICILIAN KAN by GM John Emms covers a variation of the Sicilian that is not well covered in the chess literature. The only book in English devoted to it in the last 10 years was WINNING WITH THE KAN by Ali Mortazavi back in 1996. That was a rather slender volume and written before the wave of ideas with …Qb6 had surfaced. The Sicilian Kan deals with the sequence 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 a6 and differs from its cousins the Taimanov (1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nc6) and the Scheveningen (1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e6) in the fact that the development of the Queen Knight is usually to d7 and that ...d6 is often delayed to facilitate quick Queenside play with …b5.

If you have often heard of this opening called the Paulsen you are also right, more so if you give credit to Wilfried Paulsen, who played it before his better-known brother Louis. Of course, merely stumbling into a sequence of moves doesn’t confer ownership. However, if you look at Louis Paulsen’s games from Breslau 1889 against Tarrasch, Metger and Gossip you will discover he was a hypermodern well in advance of Breyer and Nimzovitch. In that event he anticipated Boleslavsky’s …e5 in the Sicilian and played the Scheveningen in thoroughly modern style -- rather impressive since the opening didn’t get its name until Scheveningen 1923. The late Imre Koenig pointed this out in long-forgotten articles that were published in the Chess Coresspondent and California Chess Reporter in the late 1950s.

The Sicilian Kan offers something for players of both colors. Those who face it will find comprehensive coverage of the most popular line, 5.Bd3, with the bulk of the book (117 pages) devoted to it. All of Black’s tries (5…Nf6, 5…Bc5, 5…g6, 5…Nc6, 5…Ne7 and even 5…d5 (not quite as bad as it looks) are considered. For Black, particular attention is paid to the currently very popular line 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 a6 5.Nc3 b5 6.Bd3 Qb6!? which has been used so successfully by GM Goldin in American Swisses.

The Kan is not as theoretical as other lines of the Sicilian so Emms plan of grouping the material around 75 well-annotated games works well for this opening.

YOU CAN FIND THIS BOOK AT