STARTING OUT: ALEKHINE’S DEFENCE

Author: John Cox

Everyman (2004)

192 pages

$18.95

Reviewed by John Watson

Everyman is pouring out books of many types about a huge range of openings. They have a number of series: (a) the “Starting Out With the [name of opening]” series, e.g., Ward’s STARTING OUT WITH THE NIMZO-INDIAN; (b) the “[Name of Opening] Revealed” series, e.g., THE SICILIAN Bb5 REVEALED by McDonald; the “Play the [name of opening]” series, e.g., PLAY 1.e4 e5! by Davies, a very strong book reviewed in the next column. They also publish opening manuals with unadorned titles such as Taylor’s recent BIRD’S OPENING. These are all of varying quality and type, ranging from relatively elementary books for developing players to ones containing analysis dense enough for the professional. It seems that hardly any opening is left untouched, and as far as I can see all of the prominent theoretical authors of England are represented, along with various “foreigners,” including expatriates and Americans. Personally, having used a few on particularly broad subjects, I think that many deserve more care by the author [and by anyone who is going over the analysis for him]. Too many of these books are being written by someone who hasn’t (or hardly) played the opening in question, and many otherwise good authors are simply producing too many books, CDs, videos, etc. Nevertheless, the average player may need an overview of material more than he needs accurate details of analysis. And the more specialized books in these series give a better impression.

The “Starting Out” series has the most books; one such is STARTING OUT: ALEKHINE’S DEFENCE by John Cox.  I thought that I’d pick out this particular repertoire book, now going on two years old, because I’ve read most of it and because Cox’s presentation is so refreshing. He convincingly shows that the Alekhine’s can be a practical weapon for the average player and perhaps much stronger ones. Cox also uses an interesting approach that serves players of both colors well. He suggests a “solid” White repertoire, a “tactical, theoretical” White repertoire, and even a “Offbeat tries for White” repertoire. For Black he puts forward a “non-theoretical” repertoire, a “positional” repertoire, and a “tactical” repertoire. Thus the reader can find something to suit his or her style (a la Lars Bo Hansen!). This general approach has been seen elsewhere but I wish that it was used more often.

An example: like many players I have looked to the Voronezh Variation 1.e4 Nf6 2.e5 Nd5 3.d4 d6 4.c4 Nb6 5.exd6 cxd6 6.Nc3 g6 7.Be3 Bg7 8.Rc1 0-0 9.b3 for an advantage. After 9...e5, concrete analysis takes over and the theory of this line has advanced since the book, helped in fact by Cox’s own submissions to ChessPublishing.com. That would be in Black’s tactical repertoire but it is facing serious difficulties. The tactical player may still wish to use dynamic lines against other 7th and 8th moves while switching to Davies’ 9...e6 or 9...Bd7 to serve as an alternative in the Voronezh.

For the “positional” repertoire, 5...exd6 is a less critical move that is holding up well. It is given in the non-theoretical repertoire, with a choice between the two recaptures for his positional one [I’d stick with the safer 5...exd6].  There are numerous ways for both sides to play around with alternatives, although I have to say that I’ve never liked 1.e4 Nf6 2.e5 Nd5 3.d4 d6 4.Nf3 dxe5 5.Nxe5 c6 at all for Black. I should emphasize that this is no detailed theoretical tome and certainly contains some errors (it is already dated!), so you should expect to be given the spirit of the opening with no illusions of getting an airtight repertoire.

STARTING OUT: ALEKHINE’S DEFENCE is well written and to my mind serves the main purpose of this series as a guide for the inexperienced player, but with some fairly advanced material interwoven for the more experienced one. This division is typical of most of the Starting Out series, although a few recent ones tend to be rather advanced. The “Revealed” series tries to concentrate more upon general ideas and a relatively small group of thoroughly annotated games with plenty of written explanation. I wish that I could guide you through Everyman’s abundant offering and will try to do so in the future once I examine (or get feedback about) more of these books.

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