What if chess weren’t about memorized openings and standard patterns, but about creatively adapting your knowledge of the game? In Chess960, every game begins from a random starting position, so there are no predictable set-ups, and even familiar ideas need to be re-examined on their concrete merits. The chaos forces players to think independently, reinventing concepts on the fly. Yet good chess strategy is still paramount, and there are many new opportunities for alert tacticians to catch their opponents out, even in the first two or three moves.
With Chess960 increasingly popular in top-level chess and online play, it is a good moment for players of all standards to study this new form of the game seriously. By studying games from recent practice, specialist author Johannes Carow draws lessons about how to think about the start position before the game, and how to bring each type of piece into the action. There are many surprising ideas and insights. Some strategic ideas are completely unique. Did you realize that White’s first pawn move might threaten – by advancing to the fifth rank on move two! – to stymie the development of the enemy minor pieces?
But this book doesn’t just teach you manage the randomness and quirks of Chess960. It uses its unpredictability as a mirror, to help you see standard chess in a new light. Understanding this variant’s complexities will help you form a deeper understanding of the underlying logic of chess. By seeing regular chess (a.k.a. Position 518!) as a special case from a wide spectrum, its maxims and convention will make more sense, as will the rationale for sometimes ‘breaking the rules’.
International Master Johannes Carow is from Mainz. He won German youth championships in regular chess in 2012 and 2013, and tied for first in the German Chess960 Rapid Championship in 2017, the same year in which he obtained the IM title. His interest in Chess960 has been strong throughout his development as a player, being sparked by his participation in the 2007 Chess Classics Mainz. He teaches chess pupils of a wide range of levels online.