The Zukertort System: A Guide for White and Black [Paperback]

I've been taking time recently to familiarize myself with this opening. I've never played it, but I am certainly considering it given the quality of material around for it. So take this review as one from an outsider and addressed to class players.

The book is not your first Zukertort book. Unless you are quite experienced, if you tried to take on the opening from this book alone you would be hopelessly overwhelmed (much better would be Killer Opening Repertoire). The book restricts itself exclusively to the Zukertort, and only in the contexts where it is a viable opening. It does not treat it as a system-based one size fits all opening, and it offers absolutely nothing about anti-Zukertorts or companion openings that would be part of a viable repertoire. This is ideal supplementary material for "owning" the opening once you have become acquainted with its essentials. And I mean ideal.

The book is organized around development patterns and their associated middlegames. It is most definitely not organized around variations, although it contains plenty of analysis. Several schemes for White and Black are presented with illustrative games and discriminating commentary. I think it is best read cover to cover. You could use it as a reference to some extent, but you would want to be very familiar with the opening already or you will never find anything. There is no variation index, for example.

The discussions are sufficient but not wordy. You are expected to play through the games and read the commentary in light of that experience. It's not chess fast food. The selection of games is very deliberate and didactic. It is very thorough and IMO explains the development plans for Black and White (equally) very clearly, especially since this thing is a transpositional jungle. Some analysis is excessively detailed, but it's easy to ignore and it's nice to have the detail there if you are sufficiently dedicated (it's anything but a data dump though - don't get me wrong). This IM has been playing the opening for a long time and knows it well. I believe you would be very well placed after a serious study of his book. It has the added advantage that it's a pretty "stable" opening, so once you master it you are unlikely to need the incessant revision that comes with mainlines.

I was very pleasantly surprised by this one. Offering such a feast of material on the opening makes it all the more attractive. The author was generous with his ideas and, to the extent that I can tell, has presented an accurate and honest appraisal of the opening. Highly recommended for the serious student, and something that the author can be very proud of. If you're already a rusted-on Zukertort fan with a good work ethic then you would be out of your mind not to buy this.

After my initial review I have docked a star for a lack of summarization and conclusions. You really do need to read the whole book to get the benefit and it shouldn't require that degree of commitment IMO. I still like it alot though.

The author has done a fantastic job in going through the various middlegames that you would encounter with the Zukertort System. My only complaint is that the author spends some time going over the name of this opening, stating that it's really not important, and then adds to the confusion by proceeding to add yet another name to the mix -- the "Jusupovka" in honor of Grandmaster Artur Yusupov who adopted the system as a specialty of his. This, of course, is a very minor quibble, but if the name is of so little importance -- as he states in the first several pages of the book -- why does he insist on coming up with yet another name for it? The "Zukertort System" is a name which is accepted by almost all of us so please stick to it.
What I find of very high valuable in this book is the list of "Tactical Methods and Strategic Themes" found at the end of the book which refers to the pages where these methods and themes are discussed. This is not a openings book which presents a sequential listing of variations but rather one that discusses the Zukertort System's typical middlegames. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to play the Zukertort System or to those who end up fighting against it.