Play the Nimzo-Indian [Paperback]

"Play the Nimzo-Indian" is one of the newest offerings from Everyman Chess, one of the top publishers of chess books in the English language. It is written by a young Scottish IM, Edward Dearing, who is perhaps best known for his previous book "Play the Sicilian Dragon," a book which received almost unanimous praise from reviewers (with the exception of GM Sergey Tiviakov, who strongly criticized it in New In Chess Yearbook 75). Dearing is quickly establishing himself as one of the more conscientious and instructive writers of books about chess openings.

"Play the Nimzo-Indian" is a repertoire book for the player of the Black pieces. It is important note that the Nimzo-Indian arises after 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4, and this book only provides a repertoire for Black from that position. Black players taking up the Nimzo-Indian as a defense to 1.d4 for the first time will also need to come up with a repertoire against the other major third move alternative, 3.Nf3 (the Queen's Indian, Bogo-Indian and Modern Benoni are three possibilities), and against less theoretically challenging deviations (the Torre Attack, Trompovsky, Colle System, London System, Veresov, etc.). However, the Nimzo-Indian itself is a huge subject, and it seems to me that it is correct to cover a Nimzo-Indian repertoire in a separate book. As a caveat to this review, I should note that I don't presently play the Nimzo-Indian with the Black pieces myself, although it was my first defense to 1.d4 and as a 1.d4 player I have played various lines against it over the years, so I have some familiarity with it.

"Play the Nimzo-Indian" is in Everyman's usual "complete games" format, in which the author uses complete games to demonstrate and explain the critical lines in the repertoire. I consider this format to be optimal for players learning a new opening, because including complete games allows the player to study typical middlegames and endgames arising from the opening as well as the opening theory. There are 50 main games in this book, which is perhaps close to the average number for an Everyman opening book. However, this book is a substantial 224 pages in length, well above average for an Everyman production. The extra pages result from a greater than usual amount of analytical sidelines and explanatory material in the text.

There are several features in this book that I consider to be improvements on Everyman's traditional "complete games" format. First, there is a two-page index of variations in the back which I don't recall seeing in previous Everyman books but which is extremely useful for quickly locating games played in specific lines. Everyman has received some criticism in the past for not having an index of variations and finally seem to have done something about it.

Second, and perhaps more significantly, after each of the 50 main annotated games there is a short (anywhere from a paragraph to almost a full page in length) "Conclusions" section (e.g., "Game 1 Conclusions," "Game 2 Conclusions," etc.) which discusses the theoretical significance of the preceding game, lessons to drawn, and often notes typical middlegame maneuvers/themes/ideas. I found these sections, notwithstanding their brevity, to be very useful in helping me assimilate the games and place them in their proper theoretical context. This is a very welcome innovation from Dearing and I hope Everyman considers making it standard in their future opening books in the "complete games" format.

As for the theory and games presented, the Nimzo-Indian is a sound and dynamic defense to 1.d4 that has been played by virtually every World Champion of the last 50 years and the majority of the world's top players in that period as well. It is extremely solid while presenting opportunities to play for a win with Black against all levels of opposition. Because there are so many viable subvariations in this opening, Dearing has had a wealth of lines from which to chose his repertoire, and in general I think he has done an excellent job in making his selections. Of course, the selection of which subvariation to play in a major defense like the Nimzo-Indian involves issues pertaining to personal style and preference, and not everyone will be happy with every one of Dearing's choices. However, the richness of the Nimzo-Indian is such that you will always have a number of alternatives if you don't like a specific variation chosen by Dearing. And overall I think Dearing has done a good job of presenting a repertoire that will appeal to a broad spectrum of players.

"Play the Nimzo-Indian" presents a Nimzo-Indian repertoire that will be playable (and is played) at virtually any level, from the club player to the super-GM. This is not the kind of "quick fix" repertoire often presented by lazy or dishonest authors and intended for weaker players who want an easy solution to their opening problems. The players of the Black pieces in the annotated main games include such famous GMs as Karpov, Anand, Korchnoi, Ivanchuk, Gelfand, Short, Bareev, Adams and Khalifman. In general, Dearing presents a very serious, even ambitious, repertoire, and chances are good that the main repertoire choices by Dearing will remain playable for the rest of your chess career.

The downside of choosing a really sound opening repertoire is that there is usually quite a bit of theory involved, as sound lines are popular with good players. Dearing has done a very reasonable job of limiting the amount of theory presented, often by choosing slightly less theory-intensive but very sound alternatives to the absolute main lines. That having been said, presenting a serious Nimzo-Indian repertoire is not a trivial task, and notwithstanding the "complete games" format this book has a lot of theory packed into its 224 pages. Because of the amount of theory, I would primarily recommend this book for ambitious players willing to do a certain amount of work to prepare a sound opening that will last them for a lifetime. Due to the wealth of explanatory material, I think that most of the book would be accessible to players above 1800 elo, although ambitious lower-rated players might find much that is useful and enlightening here.

I give this book 5 stars. In the genre of opening books in the "complete games" format, it is one of the two or three best that I have seen.

It is very rare that people have a lot of fun reading a chess book. It is rarer still that people enjoy reading an opening book. Dearing is the antithesis of all that common opinion.

The teaching format of this book is exemplary, far beyond that of any other book I've read. Every chapter starts off with a very thorough, plain English explanation of the variation at hand. Unlike most chess books, where it lasts two pages and is just a summary of what's in the chapter, Dearing usually spends at least four pages explaining the themes behind the variation. He does so very thoroughly but with absolutely readable and funny prose. It is rare to find this much work done on introductions; most authors recommend repertoires which promise "little theory!" or an "easy route to equality" or perhaps just "a very simple plan". We have all read these cliches (for more on this read Steve Lopez's chess cliche article [...] Very entertaining!). Further, these are rarely the best or most challenging lines. The lines that Dearing picks, however, are not only solid (Black will not lose out of the opening) but dynamic and above all, INTERESTING!

When he gets to annotating the games, his commentary is second to none. When Serper plays 21.Nd4!! The move is given a diagram, and the annotation "Oops!" Of course after black's reply he explains thoroughly the move's idea and the resulting variations. Other good annotations are "See, we didn't lose the rook. It was a sacrifice. Honest." Not many chess authors are brave enough to put in this kind of annotation in their books, but Dearing is witty and has fun quirks to his writing like this. It makes it sound like you're taking a lesson from a human, not simply "studying chess."

The quality of all the lines is great, the analysis is perfect, the games are all very high-level, and the writing is magnificent. I rarely give 5 stars out, but this one really deserves it.

Everyman Chess is the leading chess publishing house in my humble opinion. There books are not only informative, which of course is the point, but they are formatted nicely (no odd page breaks or weird fonts or sloppy layout) and the paper used is acid-free and will last for years to come if treated properly. There is excellent contrast as well between the ink and the paper as well as being glare-free which is a big plus when you are staring at pages with small letters and numbers on them for hours at a time.

So with that said, this series of "Play the ..." is one of their best though it is not for beginners. They should see the fine "Starting Out ..." series. In my title for this review I said it was "dense in a good way" and by this I mean this selection in this series and this series fill these books with enough games and alternate paths within those games to keep a wood-pusher busy for as long as they please. There is more information that most players at the club level and even the tournament level will probably ever use but it is easily accessible in these well indexed books.

Further, Mr. Dearing gives fine advice and direction on what variations are popular and effective and provides good philosophical thoughts behind each. For a well-rounded player unfamiliar with the Nimzo-Indian they might start with this book since it is so well explained but I'm sure they would get farther and faster by starting with the "Starting Out ..." selection of this opening.

Other selections in the "Play the ..." that I own and treasure are "Play the King's Indian" by the KID expert Joe Gallagher and "Play the Najdorf: Scheveningen Style" by the fine author John Emms, and "Play the Ruy Lopez" by Andrew Greet and they are all very fine and very 'dense' (in a good way) book as they pack more punch for your buck than any other series of a similar level.

I can't recommend this series and most of what Everyman Chess offers (tho you can also typically rely on the reviews posted by fellow chess nuts here on Amazon).