The Closed Sicilian is an ideal weapon for players who wish for an aggressive way to attack the Sicilian but have neither the time nor the inclination to learn the seemingly endless mountains of opening theory associated with Open Sicilians. In the Closed Sicilian an awareness of the typical themes is far more important than memorising variations. White's play is logical and the basic strategies are simple to master, while the deliberate and slow burning attack on the black king appeals to many.
In Starting Out: Closed Sicilian Richard Palliser takes a fresh look at this famous opening. The early moves and ideas are introduced and care is taken to explain the reasoning behind them – something that is often neglected or taken for granted. As with previous works in the popular Everyman Chess Starting Out series, the reader is helped throughout with a plethora of notes, tips and warnings highlighting the vital characteristics of the Closed Sicilian and of opening play in general.
User-friendly design to help readers absorb ideas
Concentrates on the key principles of the Closed Sicilian
I have been playing Closed Sicilian for over a year now and all I would use were the databases and some old games like those of Spassky with good annotations. Palliser's book is well-written and although the author is not well-known, the book impressed me for its quality.
The ideas are presented in a way that does not scare an amateur and are easy to understand. It is two weeks that I am working with it and I played over 20 blitz games with it, won 16 and drew 4!! Sometimes against pretty diehard Sicilian players.
The good thing about the book is that it follows the natural way for an amateur to master Closed Sicilian. One can start with the first two chapters - 6.f4, play it for a while, then gradually study the next two chapters - 6.Be3 and start using both options, later on one may wish to use (occasionally though I would think) the lines with 6.Nge2 or 6.Nh3 or even 2.d3 or 2.g3.
Only a few chess players work at chess to the best of their abilities.
Boris Gelfand
Puzzle Answer
1.Rd7! Bxd7 2.Qxd7 Qb6+ 3.Kh1 Re8 4.Rxe7! Rxe7 5.Bd6 Qxd6 6.Qxd6+- Gelfand-Salov, Madrid 1996 (Source: Anthology of Chess Combinations)
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