Publisher's Synopsis
Comprehensive Chess Endings is a five volume master work by one of the world's leading authorities on the Chess Endgames, Grandmaster Yuri Averbakh. It was original published in Russian as Шахматные окончания Слон против коня Ладья против легкой фигуры This English version is a direct translation from the Russian except that the order of the volumes has been changed. Ishi Press has published one of the original Russian Language Volumes. That is Averbakh Chess Endings Bishop against Knight, Rook against Minor Pieces ISBN 4871875024 That is the same as volume 2 in this English Language version. The contents are exactly the same, other than the translation from Russian to English. This series was first published in the Soviet Union in 1954 with a blue hard cover. It was reprinted with modifications in 1981 with a soft orange cover. Each time, the order of the volumes has been changed. Here we are following this order: Comprehensive Chess Endings, Volume 1, Bishop Endings, Knight Endings ISBN 4871875032 Comprehensive Chess Endings, Volume 2, Bishop Against Knight Endings, Rook Against Minor Piece Endings ISBN 4871875040 Comprehensive Chess Endings, Volume 3, Queen and Pawn Endings Queen Against Rook Endings Queen Against Minor Piece Endings ISBN 4871875059 Comprehensive Chess Endings, Volume 4, Pawn Endings ISBN 4871875067 Comprehensive Chess Endings, Volume 5, Rook Endings ISBN 4871875075 An earlier series of the same books had a different order. There the order was 1: pawn endings 2: bishop and knight endings 3: bishop vs knight; rook vs minor pieces 4: rook endings 5: queens endings. Because of the popularity of these books, they have become rare and difficult to obtain. After a worldwide search we still have not been able to obtain a copy of volume 5. We had even began to suspect that it was a phantom book, a book that had been planned and announced but never actually published. Even the Russian language original editions of this book are difficult to obtain, although 100,000 were printed. In most cases in these books there is a co-author. Here, the knight endings are co-authored by Vitaly Chekhover.
