Winning Chess Tactics for Juniors

by Lou Hays

This book is an easier version of Combination Challenge!, also by Lou Hays. It contains 535 one- two- and three-move combinations to solve and teaches a study method for learning to play combinative chess. This is the quickest and easiest way to improve your chess rapidly.

Genres: Chess

128 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 1994

Reviews

[Scott Gregory · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great if you happen to have this little book handy and are looking for intermediate puzzles in a paper back form. But sometimes its solutions are not always the only solutions or even the best ones. Nowadays there are better versions of such a book.

[Sergei Moska · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great book in spite of itself. Its flaws:

-a few of the solutions given are actually not the strongest possible moves (I checked)
-the "study method" is pretty laughable. It amounts to "go over this book until you hit a point where you solved each of the problems at least three times"
-some of the solutions are longer than "3 move" solutions
-the division into themes at times seems more confusing that anything. Some of the themes provide a meaningful hint (e.g.: "knight forks", "back rank"), but others don't seem very helpful. A given problem could easily be in the "overloading" or "deflection" section, for example, and this because there is a "double attack" going on
-some of the problems are repeats from the author's more advanced "Combination Challenge!" I have no problem with this, but some people will complain about paying twice for the same material
-the title really is a test of the reader's dignity. :) Hays says that the rationale behind the title is that: "It is priced with the junior chessplayer in mind."

Still, 4 stars. This is the only book that I've found that provides a good number of problems aimed at weak-intermediary players. If you're comfortable with basic mating themes and want a book with which to drill, I can't really think of a better bang for your buck.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

I bought this in the non-specific charity shop by Well Street market that may not even be a charity shop for 50p as part of my new regime of chess training. I do a page or two of puzzles a day (6-12) and they vary between easyish to really fucking hard. They're all forced checkmates or a win of material rather than positional. The 'Junior' in the title might put people off but it's a great great book. If you can find it, get it.

Update: It turns out it is available on Amazon [Winning Chess Tactic for Juniors] but is a wee bit more than 50p.

[Brandon O'Neil · Rating 4 out of 5]

This thing helped me a lot. Great for players 1200-1700 to go through this every day.